I have mixed feelings about this book. The premise is fantastic--a setting much like our world, but with superheroes and villains. There are henchmen and henchwomen who just need a steady paycheck, blurry lines of right and wrong on both sides of the fight, and a steady thread of sexism in some of the workplaces that doesn't stand out but feels very true to life. Then you have the main character, Anna. Caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, the pattern of her life changed forever in the way many of us grope for meaning in the face of trauma. I liked her, and many of the side characters were great. Super Collider was also believable, which isn't a particularly pleasant feeling.

So, why am I conflicted, you might ask? The beginning was a little slow...June's storyline was abrupt...the story was a bit darker and more violent than I had anticipated...but mostly, it was the ending. It was believable for the characters, and the whole book was well-written, but I was just disappointed. I wanted something different.

It took me some time to figure out what I wanted to rate this one because how I felt about the ending didn't match my other feelings. But in the end, it wasn't bad enough to alter my opinion of the book. 4 stars!

If you yell at the TV during super hero movies because you find all the damage they are doing while they "save the world" absolutely reprehensible, this is the book for you!

Natalie gives a peek into what life could be like for the other side of the fight and what could happen if they got smart enough to think small instead of fighting the heroes head on. You will find yourself rooting for the baddies. All of the characters are great and the story keeps you on your toes the entire time.

Alex McKenna does a great job of narrating and I will definitely be looking for her name on my future audio books.

While the "sympathy for the villain" genre of superhero stories is popular right now, nobody get it quite as right as "Hench". Heroes and Villains are part of an elaborate capitalist system- and our heroine/villain is good with numbers. I loved the way this book turned the traditional understanding of good vs. evil on its head and by the end had me wondering if maybe being a little villainous could do a lot of good.

This is one of my favorite books from 2020. Do you ever read comics or watch superhero movies and wonder about the common person while the city is getting destroyed during an epic battle, or even a small skirmish? When a hench-for-hire who usually does desk work gets needlessly injured by a superhero, it becomes her mission to bring superheroes down. As she begins tallying the human cost of superheroes (how many people are accidentally killed each year? how many are injured? how many lose their families or their livelihoods?), it becomes much more obvious something needs to be done. With a snarky and intelligent lead, this book debates who is truly good and evil and what that means by following a henchman through a rise in the ranks to bring down superheroes and save the world.

4.5 stars

What a fun, thrilling and surprisingly thought-provoking book. This would have been five stars for me except for a few draggy sections peppered through the beginning and middle. It's been said by other reviewers but if you enjoy Amazon's The Boys, then Hench should be right up your alley.

Who doesn't love a good anti-hero tale? Especially when the anti-hero is everything you could ever want in a hero? There are so many books that center on the "good guy" and this was a breathe of fresh air. You see the other side of the story and you cannot help but root for the bad guys!

I've heard this book compared to the comic/TV series "The Boys" and I just don't think that does it justice. Like "The Boys," "The Watchmen," and even the recent Marvel & DC films, a major plot point is the ethics behind the use of superpowers and the unavoidable collateral damage caused by superheroes in the line of duty. The story takes place in a world where superpowers are part of reality.
Everyone is tested for powers at a young age and those with powers are guided on a path for life. This part of the story is not fleshed out as much as I'd like but that's not what the story is about. It is about a regular person just trying to get by working as an office temp...for supervillains. In the process, she is injured by a superhero, turning her life upsidedown. This leads her on a journey of revenge, truth-seeking, and self-discovery. There's action, humor, friendship, dating, ethics, emotions, a little of everything. I would describe it as Justice League meets Office Space.

This is a really great book! I read the physical book along with the audiobook, and it was really enjoyable! I like that it was not like any other book that I have ever read and it was definitely a "page-turner."

DNF @ 70%

I feel bad DNFing this book because I truly was pulled in by the synopsis and interested in where it was going. I liked Anna’s perspective with her cynical and dry wit. Her injury and subsequent disabilities were realistic and good representation. This just failed to continue to hold my attention due to the lack of action. There is a lot of plotting and scheming with little on page follow through. I tried to persevere, but I found myself having to constantly rewind from getting distracted. I haven’t picked this up in two weeks and barely remember the plot. I will still recommend this as it is a cool premise, but it lost my attention.

I found this be an utterly delightful audiobook. I laughed, gasped, and thoroughly enjoyed this story. It was an exciting take on the superhero culture. I was also pleasantly surprised by the discussion of morality that this book posed. I think the narrator did a remarkable job. I was able to get fully invested in the book and her narration really helped with that.

Hench was great fun, well written, and thought- provoking! It’s about time henchmen got their due and Walschots’ heroine Anna fits the bill! But the reader can look deep beneath the surface of Hench and also see the damage today’s society inflicts on the defenseless.
Highly recommended.

This book just didn't do it for me. I have a weakness for superhero books with a twist, but it didn't grab me. Part of this may have been the narrator. I gave the book an hour before surrendering.

This book was so unique and interesting! Anna works for a temp service but it is a very unique temp service they temp out Hench's for super villain's but when she is hurt by a super hero everything changes. Don't want to give any more than that away and that much is in the description.

This is just such a unique book. If you are a fan of the show The Boys I highly recommend this book I think you will love it!

Narrated by Alex McKenna who does a really wonderful job at the narration everyone has their own voice and accent. I will definitely look for this narrator again.

I will read whatever else this author puts out. Highly recommend this one!

4 Stars

In a slightly alternate modern setting, heroes and villains slug it out every day. There are temp agencies for villains, and we met Anna as she is going in for a call for data entry work for a villain. She has few friends and they all also do temp work for villains. Anna gets an onsite job for a minor villain and as working as background setting when the villain is working a kidnapping plot. An “A” level hero stops it and Anna is badly injured. During her healing she comes up with a spreadsheet on the cost of heroes on people lives. Her spreadsheets get her a job with an A level villain and then things really get interesting. The worldbuilding in the book is great and lots of thought on the little bits that build a better background and expand the story. By the end of the story there is room for more in this setting but it does end on a satisfying note.

I also did listen to an audio review copy of the book and the narrator does an excellent job with the sarcasm between friends during the story.

Digital review copy provided by the publisher through Edelweiss and NetGalley

I was pleasantly surprised by this book. I didn't know what to expect going into it, but seeing as I like a good spin on oft-used tropes and/or genres, I thought I'd give it a whirl. I'm glad I did. Walschots created relatable characters. She also presented a fresh take on a well worn cultural phenomenon--the superhero.

DM

I received this ARC title from NetGalley in exchange for a honest review.

A professional henchwoman who gets laid off from her temp job for one villain, only to be hired on permanently for a supervillain looking to take down the superhero. In this book, superheroes are actually maladjusted show-offs just voguing for their faithful fans, and end up being huge jerks "off screen."

Anna is whip-smart and masterful at analyzing all the data to come up with brilliant strategic take-downs, ones a superhero never expects. With a bit of mentorship from her new supervillain boss, she finds her stride and is able to be the villainous henchwoman she always dreamed.

This book was full of sarcasm and wit with a heaping portion of superhero versus supervillain square-offs. Lots of action and adventure with plenty of character development, and you'll be left feeling truly empathetic for the poor villains. The book also includes LGBTQIA relationships as just a part of the flow of the plot, which is always nice. The biggest reason for my rating is that the book did feel dragging after the first half at various points, and I think it would have benefited from being a bit shorter, but overall, a really fun, creative, original hero/villain plot.

As I listened to the audiobook version of this, read by Alex McKenna, I'll mention how much of an absolute pleasure it was listening to McKenna read. The voice changes were subtle but helpful, the tone was perfectly on point, and I laughed right along with every sarcastic remark and comment. I would definitely explore other audio versions with Alex McKenna as their reader.

I am thrilled that we can get audio books now and just want to say this is one to listen to. I have liked most books because of the narrator and if a bad one then I loose interest quickly. Also the story was very interesting and suspenseful Try it out yourself and thanks to Netgalley and publishers!!.

Anna is a "hench," someone who provides support for the Big Bad Villain. She, specifically, does data analysis, and helps her boss Leviathan target the Good Guys to make their lives miserable. When Super Collider, whom Anna holds a grudge against since he threw her (and quite significantly injured her) as a bystander in a Heroic Act and Leviathan's Arch Nemesis, gets on Anna's radar as someone to target, things get out of hand. Anna takes it upon herself to show the world that he's not as Good as he and the rest of the pro-Good Guys propaganda would have you believe. Will Anna and Leviathan succeed in their mission in exposing Super Collider for the egomaniac he really is? Or will the "Good Guy" win again?

The narrator of Hench does a pretty good job. The voice she uses for Leviathan is like nails on a chalkboard, but that is a deliberate choice that is in-line with Leviathan's... super suit. And I didn't like the voice she uses for Greg as it wasn't how I imagined it in my head. She narrates at a good speed, and I only bumped it up to 1.25x when I was ready for things to move along in the story.

SPOILERS BELOW





3.5 stars for originality. Hench piqued my interest because it seems like an original take on superheroes, which I loved in Marissa Meyer's Renegades series. And while I did like the theme that people aren't all good or all bad, it still fell a bit flat. It drags, and it felt like the "surprise" that Anna loved Leviathan was a cop-out. Even as an avid romance reader, I was loving that there wasn't any romance-- no burning looks, no sexual tension. It was just... without. And I liked that. And then, the other shoe was dropped.

Hench follows Anna who is a hench for hire out of a temp agency, but Anna soon finds herself seriously injured after an encounter with a superhero. While Anna begins the grueling recovery process, she finds she isn't the only one who has had a less than positive run in with superheroes and begins to compile data about how much damage and loss of human life is caused not by villains, but by the superheroes who are supposed to be helping. Anna then joins up with a dangerous villain with his own issues with the superhero that caused her injuries and the two attempt to bring down heroes on a quest for revenge.

This is a case where the premise was extremely interesting and the beginning of the story and Anna had me hooked, but as Anna became even more detached from her emotions and she started her campaign to ruin superhero's lives my interest fell away. In my personal opinion, I didn't care for reading about how Anna was trying to humiliate the heroes by ruining not only their public image but also their lives. I also did not enjoy reading a few of the things that Anna or her colleagues did to the superheroes and it really took away from the book and from Anna as a character in my opinion. I did enjoy the perspective of the henches in the story and how their lives are impacted by the heroes and villains in the world. I would recommend this book to people who like books about superheroes and supervillains and want a twist on the more traditional superhero narrative.

I liked the narrator but found many of voices for the side characters to be a little grating with Alex McKenna's raspy, deep voice. I enjoyed her regular narrating voice but for some reason found it difficult at times to listen to her other intonations for the other characters.

Natalie Zina Walschots turns the superhero vs. villains trope on its head in her brilliant, over the top novel, Hench. Anna, an out of work "hench" for mid-level villains, loves data. She loves to research, accumulate facts, develop spreadsheets, and analyse data to discover complex meaning and develop plans to use it. She is horrified, however, when she discovers the untold death and destruction left in the wake of so-called superheroes. When she is finally recognized and hired by the most indestructible super villain alive, she develops a plan to expose and take down the system. What could go wrong?

Alex McKenna perfectly narrates chilling action sequences, and takes just the right tone to develop the many diverse characters. She skillfully portrays a self deprecating, witty Anna who grows into the capable, complex driving force of this novel.

Hench is not just thrilling, fast paced science fiction. It is a fresh, creative, funny and strangely poignant novel that weaves together themes of love, loyalty, vengeance and redemption.