A review by robertmorvay
Spider-Man: Hostile Takeover by David Liss

5.0

I was dead-on shocked by how gripped this book had me. After last years disappointment in Miles Morales: Ultimate Spider-Man by James Reynolds, I was terrified that comic book characters and storytellings could not be applied to prose without losing a level charm, but luckily this book blew me away in almost every regard. Gripping story, compelling characters, genuinely emotional moments, and stakes that just kept rising and rising, David Liss absolutely charmed me with this novel. David Liss understands the character and world of Peter Parker extraordinarily well, and his love of comic books shone true in every paragraph. My only complaint is that very, very occasionally there is an awkwardly delivered piece of exposition or dialogue that could’ve been caught by an editor and left in an earlier draft, but that is an absolute nitpick. As a prequel as well, this game set up so many compelling questions towards the universe Insomniac is building with their upcoming title that I personally have been looking forward to for years. I am absolutely desperate for more, and luckily I’ve only got a few weeks to wait. If the writing of the game is even a fraction as compelling as this book, Spider-Man PS4 may be something I hold dear for a long time to come.