Power Up

Supervillain Rescue Project #4

by H.L. Burke

Is being a villain ever the heroic choice?

Superpowered teen Jake escaped from his Uncle Vic's supervillain gang to find a family, friends, and future. Now, on the cusp of adulthood, he'd rather die than go back to that old life ... but if the cost to stay on the hero side of the law isn't to him, but the man who gave him the second chance, what will he choose?

When a trafficking ring targeting superpowered youths goes after Jake, his adopted father, Fade Powell, helps him escape but is himself captured in the process. Fade's friends and family scramble to find him, but with time running out and no leads, Jake receives an offer of help from an unlikely source, the uncle who tried to kill him.

Vic Lucas says he can get Fade home alive. All he wants in return? Jake's promise to return to the Sand Fox gang permanently.

Jake can't be the reason his father dies, but can he throw away the life Fade sacrificed everything to give him?

Genres: Young Adult, Superheroes, Fantasy

240 pages, Kindle Edition

Published June 19, 2022

About the author

Born in a small town in north central Oregon, H. L. Burke spent most of her childhood around trees and farm animals and was always accompanied by a book. Growing up with epic heroes from Middle Earth and Narnia keeping her company, she also became an incurable romantic.

An addictive personality, she jumped from one fandom to another, being at times completely obsessed with various books, movies, or television series (Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, and Star Trek all took their turns), but she has grown to be what she considers a well-rounded connoisseur of geek culture.

Married to her high school crush who is now a US Marine, she has moved multiple times in her adult life but believes that home is wherever her husband, two daughters, and pets are.

She is the author of a four part fantasy/romance series entitled "The Dragon and the Scholar," the Award Winning (2016 Realm Award for Young Adult Fiction) Nyssa Glass Steampunk series, and MG/Fantasy "Cora and the Nurse Dragon," among others .

Sign up for her monthly newsletter at www.hlburkeauthor.com

http://www.amazon.com/H.-L.-Burke/e/B...

Reviews

[Selina Gonzalez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mar '25 - After beta reading Game Changer in the Supervillain Legacy Project series (which features an adult Jake as a major secondary character and another seventeen year old boy trying to save his dad), I had a hankering to re-read this one. Stayed up way too late two nights in a row reading it. I think this might actually be my favorite SVR-verse book.
--
Don't touch me; I'm soft and emotional. 😭 This was everything I wanted it to be and more and I have an endless supply of feels. Just...so, so good. Drag my heart through hell and patch it back together again good. *squeezes the characters* Almost tempted to reread the Romance books that tie in even though I just read them weeks ago because my EMOTIONS.

[Tricia Mingerink · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is SO FUN! And painful! I loved all the family themes and father-son vibes. I adore all of the books this author has written in her superhero world, and I will snap up every single one of them just as quickly!

[Sarah Ryder · Rating 5 out of 5]

The perfect ending to this series! Jake has been my favorite character throughout this whole series so getting the last book mostly from his POV was exactly what I wanted and this was either action packed or angst and tension ridden to the extreme and I was on the edge of my seat the whole time.

Loved the father-son dynamic between Fade and Jake, not to mention the mother-son dynamic with Prism and Jake, and the all round “don’t you DARE touch my family!” vibe was very strong throughout and I loved it. You can also clearly see how much Jake has grown from Power On, and the contrast between him and Caleb was so stark yet also so heartbreaking as you realize what Jake would have become without Camp Sable.

I adored this book and I can’t WAIT to follow Jake further in the next Supervillain Romance Project books!


‼️Content‼️

Language: dang; jackass; crap; hell (both as a swear word and a place); what the hell; ass; screw up/screwed up; bastard; damn; screwed; heck; pissed; holy crap; frickin’; BS; frick’s sake; go to hell; what the heck; heck; dammit; what the; damning (to describe a situation)

Violence: a boy punches a man in the face; fighting with superpowers and hand to hand (not detailed); injuries and blood (not detailed); a man is stabbed in the gut (not detailed); a man is stabbed in the chest (not detailed); characters are threatened with being frozen or drowned to death; a character is tortured with electric shocks; a character slams against walls and the floor until bleeding (not detailed)

Sexual: kissing (not detailed)

Drug/Alcohol: people are gassed and knocked out; characters drink wine and beer

Other: superheroes and supervillains; superpowers; death and grief; a character has a mind control chip implanted in them

[H.L. Burke]

The fourth and final book in the Supervillain Rescue Project, YA Superhero series. Definitely should read the others first.
This series is finished, but I don't think it will be the last we hear from Jake ;) I have plans.

[M.H. Elrich · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite one of this series

I really love Jake's character and how he became a man in this book. It was an epic conclusion to a fun series.

[Jenelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

So much to love about this story. Mostly Jake and Fade. Love them.

much feelz and family themes // redemption themes // danger and stakes are raised // much growing up occurs // not as much "Camp Sable Trio" as I was expecting // Talon gets a scene at his most "Nick Fury-est" // ending made me cry... but in a good way //

[Katherine M · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awesome ending

Jake has always been my favorite of the teens in the SVR, and this was a great book. Good themes about choosing loyalties and finding your own path, and the bond between parents and children. HL Burke's humor always makes me laugh.

[Erin Dydek · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic Series Ending!

I loved this series and was so happy to see how things worked out for Jake! There were quite a few ups and downs through this book and the mom side of me definitely suffered some heartache and tears. I loved how realistic Prism is in dealing with her responsibilities and her reactions to the circumstances presented in this story. I also loved how Jake had to make tough decisions, learn from his mistakes, and come into his own as a grown man.

I’d recommend this series to teen readers who enjoy action-packed novels that tackle the tricky parts about growing up. There’s some great parent to child relationship building lessons and dealing with the unknowns of choosing a career path that should provide some good insight for young readers.

I can’t wait to read the next couple superhero books releasing later this year in other SVR series! I’m also holding out hope for another spin-off series that details Jake’s special project. It may or may not happen; I’m happy either way…just sayin’ his story could easily be a four book college-age/new adult series ;)

[Gordon · Rating 4 out of 5]

This finishes off a great series well, while leaving the door open for follow on. It's main weakness is that the core found-family of the earlier books has already begun moving on (in a good way), so this book is basically just finishing off Jake's arc. It's strength is that it spends a lot of time not just on the hero figure(s) in jeopardy but also on the toll this takes on those who love them but are powerless to do anything but wait. There's a theme here that the right thing to do is sometimes to let people do the right thing even if it hurts you to let go. An interestingly parental POV for an ostensibly YA series.

[Karen Eisenbrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

The fourth in this series of wholesome-but-gritty YA superhero stories is a satisfying conclusion. As the story opens, it seems like the first class to pass through Camp Sable will stay on the good-guy path: Marco has skilled mentor, Laleh is looking into DOSA internships, and Jake … Well, Jake’s about to turn 18. He doesn’t see himself as a hero, but plans to stick around camp to help Prism and Fade. He’s had enough excitement in his life. Then a DOSA hero shows up with a job only Jake can perform because of who he’s related to. But first, he has to make sure his brother knows he’s alive.

The ensuing mission is full of traps, double crosses, narrow escapes, terrible losses, and life-threatening peril as Jake finds himself working with his supervillain uncle to rescue his superhero dad from even worse villains. He has to use his brain when powers won’t help, and find where the line is he won’t cross, even to keep his loved ones safe. If he survives, will he even have a future when this is over?

I have enjoyed watching Jake mature over the course of this series. I found myself frustrated on his behalf when he was manipulated into once again running out in the middle of the night to try to deal with things on his own, but it worked because of the stakes and who was doing the manipulating. I loved the clever way he put out a call for help from his friends. And the future he earns sounds like it would make a thrilling story of its own.

[C.O. Bonham · Rating 5 out of 5]

Power up is the fourth book in the Supervillain Rescue Project series. However it's like the twelfth book in the ever growing SVR universe. And I am here for all of it. And if you are looking at the reviews for what amounts to the season finale of season two, I'm guessing you are here for all of it too.

Power up lives up to what I've come to expect from this series. I laughed, I cried and above all care about these characters as if they were real people. In some cases I might even care about them MORE than some real people. But your mileage may vary.

[Annie Lima · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book a lot, up until the last few chapters. It had great character development and deepening of character relationships, plus an exciting adventure full of tough choices. However, the last 5-10% felt awkward, almost clumsy, because even after the plot was over and the problems were resolved, the book just kept going and going. Normally, tying up loose ends after characters succeed in their primary goals takes maybe a chapter, but this book had several chapters of that. Some of them were spent in introducing a new mission for the main character, which would have worked very well as a whole new book, but then this book ended with an epilogue that showed him returning from that mission four years later. Huh? Ok, so we got to see him make a tough choice and grow up some more, but it really didn't help anything to TELL us that by squeezing it onto the end of a book that was about a totally separate adventure as opposed to SHOWING us by actually having him live the adventure in a new book.

Also, an editor or even a couple of thorough beta readers could have helped to avoid some embarrassing typos and a few minor inconsistencies in the story.

Still, if you can ignore the strange way the book ends, it is a great story and a worthwhile read. I recommend it to anyone who has read the rest of the series and wants to follow the characters through one more high-stakes mission.

[Leiana Day · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh my gosh. That was a ride. Best final book in a series I've read in years—maybe ever. Holy cow. Intense. Be prepared. This one is the most Marvel-esque of the SVR universe I've read so far. Really intense at times but really good. So good. Wrapped up everything so well. Man.

Huge spoiler and Fade. H. L. Burke seriously Winter-Soldier-ed Fade 😭😭😭 that- that was intense

[Kristi Cramer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another delightful read

I loved this installment of the kids super villain rehabilitation series. The epilogue even wrung a few tears out of me. 😆

[Laura · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another fantastic book in this series. I'm a big fan of the Supervillain Rescue Project. I've had a blast following each of the characters and their growth throughout each book. Highly recommended for anyone looking for a clean YA superhero read!