Superego: Betrayal

Superego #3

by Frank J. Fleming

Terrorists. A ruthless criminal syndicate. A warmongering dictatorship. And those are just Rico’s allies.

With the civilized universe conquered, it’s up to the uncivilized to fight back. Rico prefers working alone, but this time he’s leading an army against his two greatest enemies, who both have one thing in Rico’s own DNA.

Fighting a personal battle on a galactic scale, Rico enlists thieves, murderers, and malcontents (plus one space princess) to help him save the universe from tyranny.

And considering Rico’s new associates, it’s not a question of whether he’ll be betrayed, but when, and by whom.

380 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 20, 2022

About the author

I used to write political satire, but then I got sick of politics and now sticking to science fiction and fantasy. It's supposed to be more serious writing, but people keep calling them comedies :(

Newsletter: http://frankjfleming.com

Reviews

[Gavin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a very solid third instalment of the Superego series. Not quite as good as the first couple of instalments, mostly due to a slightly darker tone and a lessening in the comedic elements of the tale, but still a very enjoyable read on the whole. This series is very readable and has a nice mix of action and humour as well as a fun set of characters and a story with some fun twists and turns to keep the reader fully engaged.

In this third book we continue to follow the adventures genetically engineered psychopathic hitman Rico as he continued to give heroing a go now that he has a girlfriend! We actually got a fun story in this one. Rico might have dealt with the Fathom in the last book but thanks to his evil fathers devious ways nobody else even realised Rico had dealt with them!

I felt like the tone in this instalment was a tad more grimdark than the earlier books. A few dark ends for some interesting side characters tipped the balance especially when combined with the fact that less humour was present to offset the darker elements of the story.

It was fun to met more of Rico’s family in this one though!

All in all I enjoyed this one even if it was not quite as fun as the early books and I definitely feel like there is plenty of life left in this series.

Rating: 4 Stars. This is very readable and engaging despite a few flaws.

Audio Note: : I felt like Joel Richards did a good job with the audio. He got the tone and the humour of the story and was decent with the voices. Cassandra Alling joined the narrator team to do the POV chapters from Rico’s equally violent sister Sylvia and I felt she did a decent job.

[Scott S. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a good premise. I laughed my ass off a few times. Definitely my brand of humor and the narrator's dry delivery sends me. Dip's burns are gold.

Bad guy using mind control to speak through someone: "I know this is an odd thing to say from the body of a woman, but let's look at this rationally"

I don't think I would love the narrator for many other books, but he's really good for this character.

Jeez the last little bit broke my heart. For the well written sincerity and the relatability.

Can't wait for the next.

[cool breeze · Rating 3 out of 5]

This series is increasingly losing its edginess, which is what made it unique and great. It started out as a wild cross of dark humor, jaw-dropping political incorrectness, sci-fi, and hard-boiled noir. There hadn’t been an anti-hero like Rico since George MacDonald Fraser’s wonderful Flashman.

But Fleming has progressively dialed back what was best about the earlier books: Rico as a snarky psychopath. I don’t know if this is a bid for greater mainstream “respectability”. Maybe he has fantasies of a movie deal (Hollywood: LOL, you're blacklisted for writing devastatingly funny truths for the Babylon Bee). Perhaps he is mellowing as he gets older. Whatever, it isn’t a plus for this series. Or should I be asking, "Who ARE you, and what have you done with Frank J. Fleming???"

Fleming created a unique character with amoral misanthrope Rico in the first book, Superego. He started to make him more normal and transform him from an anti-hero into a hero in Fathom, but it still retained enough edginess to be entertaining. He is now letting him go to waste by making him even more conflicted and human. Rico’s soliloquy to an unconscious ally at the conclusion of this book is an embarrassingly bad ending that underscores his sad atrophy.

In earlier books, Rico's black heart produced gems like:

“Hana’s son and daughter are fine. She’s with them now.” It was as if Diane read my mind and picked the absolute opposite of anything I cared about to tell me.

and

“Actually ...” You always need to emphasize that word. Especially when correcting a woman.

Now, Rico shows some family concerns and we are fed a thin gruel of inoffensive lame running jokes about space princesses.

In this third book, Fleming seems to be trying to write something that is a cross between a Star Wars style space opera and a fairly conventional character drama. These are not his strengths, to put it politely. The number of characters has proliferated wildly. Many of the new characters are unmemorable distractions, notably Eldan. The plot has gotten overly complicated. I like a novel with plenty of twists, but this is over the top. Between the many forgettable characters, the constant plot complications, and two alternating first-person narrators, it is so convoluted it eventually gets tiresome. To make matters much worse, this is no longer relieved by frequent flashes of Rico’s wisecracking black humor, which are now rare.

Fleming is just average at writing a sci-fi space opera. He is unexceptional at writing a character drama. What made this series unique and wonderful was snarky sociopath anti-hero Rico and his casual misogyny and misanthropy. Fleming is only really at his best when he slaughtering some sacred cows and offending an ocean of people. Few have ever rivaled him at this (Jonathan Swift comes to mind). He needs to embrace his gift and not flinch away from it. This series is rapidly losing that. It started going downhill in the second book and the decline accelerated in this book. If Fleming wants to write an innocuous space opera with his version of the usual cliches, like space princesses, death stars and "ordinary aliens who selflessly rise to the challenge", he should start a different series, so that Rico fans can avoid it. Such series are a dime a dozen. But there is only one Rico.

Let Rico be Rico!

[K L · Rating 5 out of 5]

The third installment of Superego does not disappoint. Building on a universe in trouble and a character that's trying really hard to fake caring, Fleming still manages to take it up a notch.

This time Rico saves a space princess, keeps looking out for the furry guy, and teams up with unlikely allies. He's the psychopath we know putting "try to feel guilty" on his to-do list for later. In his own round-about, upside-down logic sort of way, he's trying to do good. The question is if he's capable, if it's worth it, and if it's even possible to save the universe as the odds continue to stack against him. And as he feels more and more responsible for Diane, it may turn out that his very worst enemy is himself; maybe, after all, the only way to remove the danger from her life is to take his own.

Also... >:( I will never forgive the author for Rico's monologue in Chapter 26. It was so damn good and so damn awful that yes, I ugly cried. But please hurry and release the next book! I NEED ANSWERS.

Some quotes from the book (that you really gotta pick up!):

"'The sword is a priceless artifact that has been passed down through generations of the royal family,' Renetta told me. 'I don't care about that,' I said, 'I just need to know whether its sharp.'"

"If I wanted to survive my best idea was to leave him. But I didn't really care about survival. I had no purpose. Nothing to achieve. And guess that's how I'd always lived-- borrowing someone else's purpose. I'd killed for the criminal syndicate. I'd fought for what Diane seemed to think was right. I could do it for someone else."

Note: I read this book like a year ago as a beta reader but FORGOT and finally got around to reviewing it now. lol

[Robert Hill · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fun read

A little more serious than the first two, but a fun read. Lots of action. Developed other characters more than the initial two.