From Goodreads: When business student Samantha Gibson finds herself cornered by a euro-trash Darth Vader wannabe in a dark alley, it’s a nightmare end to a terrible week. Of course super powers aren’t real–until someone’s using theirs to bash your head in.

It turns out that a one-in-a-million accident has caused her to catch the attention of the Talents, a group of humans with amazing abilities. And a surprising number would rather have her dead than competing with them. Sam’s happy to tell anyone who’ll listen to her that she doesn’t actually have super powers. The problem is getting anyone to listen to her.

Enter Lane, Al, and Harry, three nerdy (though Lane’s kind of a cute type of nerd) best friends and Talents. While their powers may not be glamorous, or even all that super, they’re determined to do the right thing. They politely kidnap Samantha and hit the road, racing cross-country towards a group offering protection. To independent Sam, each minute of being a damsel in distress is like an iron-spike in her foot. It’s possible that friendship, and love aren’t the liability she thought they were, but it’s also possible that she may not live to find out. Because with stronger and stranger opposition barring their way, safe haven may be just a pipe dream in a world where everyone is chasing power…

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This novel reminded me a bit of the hit TV show Heroes, but there was a huge twist in that two huge “talent” corporations compete with each other in plain sight.  Of course, things aren’t what they seem with the reversal of good and bad, and Sam and her friends find themselves in many a predicament as the story unfolds.

This cross-country story was interesting in that the characters all had special powers, and I always enjoy a book entailing superpowers, but to be honest, I found some of Samantha’s predicaments to be a little redundant.  It seemed that every time she and her “captors,” Lane, Al, and Harry stopped anywhere, whether to eat or for a pit stop, they would be attacked by the “bad guys.”  Now, as predictable as that was, the attacks were always vastly different, showing Pearson’s great imagination through the many different ways the “bad guys” used their powers in an attempt to kill Sam, so redundancy aside, it was still intriguing.

I found Lane, Al, and Harry to be very interesting characters, and I really enjoyed them, but Sam was harder to like as she took forever in coming to terms with the truth.  Though the evidence of superpowers is before her throughout the novel, from the very beginning, even, she just wouldn’t relent and fought against those trying to help her for what I thought was a bit too long.  However, I wonder how I would react if someone told me, and showed me, the same things… I might be just as hard headed as Sam, who knows.  Overall, I thought Chasing Power was a good read, and those who enjoy superhero novels should check it out.  Three and a half stars.

I received a copy of this novel from the author in exchange for an honest review.