Asian American Literature Fans

A Review of Sarah Kuhn’s Heroine Worship (Daw Books, 2017).
By Stephen Hong Sohn

Sarah Kuhn’s Heroine Worship (Daw Books, 2017) continues the hijinks we saw in the first installment (Heroine Complex, 2016, Daw Books that we earlier reviewed here on Asian American Literature Fans), but this time it takes on the first person perspective of Aveda Jupiter (otherwise known by her actual name Annie Chang). I was reluctant at first to let go of Evie Tanaka’s perspective, but as this novel moved forward, it was evident that Kuhn wanted to have the best chance at mining Aveda’s complicated and conflicted interiority. It also gives readers an even better opportunity to empathize with her, despite her diva-ish tendencies. 

The backdrop of this novel concerns Evie’s impending nuptials with Nathan, the demon turned hero, and the fact that Aveda Jupiter is the bridesmaid. Aveda must ultimately keep her controlling tendencies in check because Evie hasn’t given Aveda much time to plan and doesn’t even want a big wedding in the first place. Despite these proclamations, Aveda does take Evie shopping for the perfect wedding dress, an outing that ends disastrously and strangely just outside a boutique wedding store. Indeed, bridezillas are out in full force, but they seem to be controlled by some other demonic presence, one that takes over the personalities of an individual. Aveda and her team of superheroes (which include her almost-love interest Scott, Evie’s younger sister Bea, amongst some others) discover that there may be some sort of remnants left over from the demon portal they closed from the first novel. These remnants are nicknamed demon puppies, and they have the capacity to take on the shapes and spaces of things around them. So, the team must track the demon puppy, who seems to have taken a shining to anything bridal related, making Aveda’s wedding planning all the more difficult. Indeed, at one point, it seems that Evie’s own dress has become possessed, and it attempts to kill Evie. This set-up is quite obviously ludicrous, but quite obviously following the comic tonalities of the first novel, so readers should expect the combination of the idiosyncratic with the superheroic and the romantic, all rolled into one. Fun stuff!

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Review Author: Stephen Hong Sohn
Review Editor: Leslie J. Fernandez

If you have any questions or want us to consider your book for review, please don’t hesitate to contact us via email!
Prof. Stephen Hong Sohn at ssohnucr@gmail.com
Leslie J. Fernandez, PhD Student in English, at lfern010@ucr.edu