"Spider-Man: Kraven's Last Hunt" by Neil Kleid

            The following is a review of the prose novelization of “Spider-Man: Kraven’s Last Hunt” by Neil Kleid and not the graphic novel of the same name.

            To start, we’ll talk about the five main characters to establish some history to those who are unfamiliar with Spider-Man or this story. This is important as the whole story hinged on these five characters. Some of the history of these characters were not actually contained in this novel itself and is therefore inferred from my knowledge of the Marvel Comics.

            Peter Parker/Spider-Man: Peter Parker was a high school science nerd and not very popular with the other students at his school, even bullied by students such as Midtown High School football hero “Flash” Thompson. His parents died when he was a little boy and he was raised by his elderly Aunt May and Uncle Ben. One day, he went to a demonstration of radioactivity. A spider got in the way of the radiation and was irradiated. Dying, it bit Peter. Peter soon discovered he could walk on walls and had the proportionate speed, strength, and agility of a spider, and a precognitive sense of personal danger he calls “spider-sense.” He also created web shooters. He started off in show biz. One day, he let a burglar run by him after a heist. He came home and found his Uncle Ben had been murdered. He chased down the murderer and caught him and saw his Uncle Ben’s killer was the same thief he let run by him. He remembered his Uncle Ben saying that “with great power there must also come great responsibility” and decided to use his powers to help people, fight crime, and stop the threats of super villains who were too powerful for any non-powered people to take down.

            Sergei Kravinoff/Kraven the Hunter: Sergei Kravinoff came from an aristocratic Russian family of great nobility. His father was eventually disgraced and his mother became insane. Sergei made a name for himself as a game hunter, and took on the name “Kraven the Hunter.” He kept himself youthful with mixtures of special herbs and potions. He prided himself on being able to defeat any animal and came to the United States to hunt down the deadliest animal of all: man. But not just any man. Spider-Man. Kraven had many encounters with Spider-Man over the year, occasionally teaming up with other super villains in The Sinister Six, but ultimately was defeated each time.

            Mary Jane Watson: Mary Jane Watson was your regular party girl, never staying with any one man for any length of time, until her Aunt Anna introduced her to Peter Parker. The two fell in love and dated for a while. Peter has just told Mary Jane that he is Spider-Man, which totally changed her opinion of Peter, now toying with leaving her home in New York City.

            Ned Leeds/Hobgoblin: Reporter Ned Leeds was the rival of Peter for the love of Betty Brant, the secretary at the Daily Bugle newspaper. Peter eventually let Ned have Betty, and Ned and Peter had a sort of friendship, and Ned eventually married Betty. Ned secretly became the super villain the Hobgoblin, one of Spider-Man’s deadliest enemies. The Hobgoblin has just been taken out permanently, but his specter still haunts Peter.

            Edward Whelan/Vermin: Edward Whelan was a brilliant scientist in the employ of Oscorp. CEO of Oscorp was the late Norman Osborn, who was the Green Goblin, Spider-Man’s arch-nemesis. Norman experimented on Edward against his will and mutated him into a hideous creature. Edward now has a split personality as the childish coward Edward and the monstrous Vermin. Vermin can communicate and manipulate rodents, particularly rats. He has been getting food from single women who walk by his hiding place. Vermin was so dangerous a villain to Spider-Man that Spidey had to team up with Captain America to defeat Vermin. Vermin now has sworn revenge on Spider-Man and Captain America.

            Okay, we’ve now established the background of these characters, now I’ll explain the story. Kraven has decided he will have a final showdown with Spider-Man. To this effect, he has hunted down and “killed” Spider-Man and burying him alive. Now he has decided to truly make his defeat of Spider-Man have the greatest meaning, he has now become Spider-Man. But his replacing Spider-Man has not been to deliver justice in Peter’s style. Kraven has now kidnapped Vermin, proving himself the superior Spider-Man for defeating the foe that the original Spider-Man could not. For two weeks, Kraven impersonated Spider-Man, until the real Spider-Man awakens and returns for his final showdown with Kraven and stop the threat of Vermin.

            Now, for those of you who don’t know how my reviews work, I do three main follow-ups to my synopsis of the book. The first is my own personal opinions of the story. The second is the accessibility. Finally, I give the book a numeric rating based on my feelings towards the content of the book as a whole.

            Okay, we’ll start with my personal opinion. I actually did not thoroughly enjoy this book. That said, there were elements I did like. But the story seemed just so weak to me. There were several main points to the story, yes, but I found the time in-between to be rather dull and drawn out. But I felt the actual main points were well done, just I wish there had been more of them. Also, the chapter length was actually a pain to me. This book was a very easy read. The chapters were very short, I think the longest being nine pages, even chapters that were just one page. This was due to the constant shift of the narrative between four of the primary characters. If Kleid had actually stayed with a character for more than a few pages at a time, I feel the jumbled narrative would have been more stable and interesting. There were also repeated phrases that got at best dull, at worst annoying. I often enjoy easy reads, but this was just too easy. That is not to say this is a children’s book. The content was very adult, including mild profanity and some of the narrative required knowledge of mental illness as there were psychological moments.

            Alright, we’ll now move on to accessibility. What I mean by accessibility to those who have never read a review of mine before is how easy this book is for people who are casual fans of the characters and events or people who have never read anything about the characters or events. In other words, if you know nothing about Spider-Man, would you still be able to pick up and understand the story? This book was very self-contained. If you just want to read a Spider-Man book for the sake of reading a Spider-Man book, yes you’ll be able to understand it. Of course, if you want to. I’ve been pretty harsh to the book, so you might want to avoid it. But if you’re a Spider-Man fan, there is a chance you might like it. Not I give everything on my personal opinion. I won’t say if a book is good or bad, I’ll say if I think a book is good or bad. I’m not you, after all, I can’t tell you what to think. But if you’re reading this review and are considering reading the book just based on this review, totally pick this book up, you’ll probably enjoy it. I won’t say if you will or won’t, I’m not you, but I would absolutely recommend it to you.

            Okay, now the important part; my score. I’ve established everything already, so I won’t approach this for all too long, I’ll just give you a number. My scoring is on a scale of one to ten, by the way. One is I thought the book was so awful I wish I hadn’t read this, ten is that this book was so good I’m going to read it again in a few months. Obviously you’re not expecting a super high score, but here it is: Five. If this surprises you based on what I previously stated and were expecting a lower score, read this review again more thoroughly and you’ll see why I say this, I honestly can’t explain my score any better than that.

            And that’ll do it for this review. If you’re here, that means you read the whole review at least once, and I totally appreciate that. I thank you for the support. I know I can go on for quite a while, so honestly, you are THE BEST! Keep an eye out for more work from me, I do plenty more than simple book reviews, and I have a lot more ideas to pitch your way, so if you liked this review, follow me on Twitter, keep coming back, I hope you like all the other content I post. So now, there are just three more words I have for you: Tim Cubbin… out!