Those Who Walk In Darkness by John Ridley

Imagine an L.A. in the not too-distant future, where humans had learned to co-exist with superhumans. Where death defying rescues and city-shattering duels were a part of everyday life. What if the government, tired of cleaning up the mess, stripped superhumans of their rights as citizens and gave them 30 days to get out of town? What if you were the unfortunate sap who was brought on to a police special forces unit to enforce this law?

John Ridley has crafted a tense, action-packed, probably-was-intended-to-be-a-pitch-for-a-movie-but-didn't-get-picked-up-yet novel. Our hero, Soledad "Bullet" O'Roarke, is a take no guff, loner bad-ass mama with a gun. A special gun designed to take down superhumans. She uses the ordinance on her first mission out, bags herself a mutie, and is then taken down by internal affairs for using an unregulated firearms. As she fights to return to the force, Los Angeles sees a spike in Metanormal activity, and Soledad gives chase, killing another mutant while off duty. And here's where the story gets interesting: Soledad is an unapologetic racist. A bigot with a gun and a license to use it. She hates mutants because of an incident in her past where her family narrowly missed being wiped out with the rest of San Francisco in an attack by a vigilante. This time, the mutant she takes out off-duty is innocent. A girl who helped hundreds of people avoid a disaster. May have saved countless lives. Soledad doesn't care. For her, the only good freak is a dead freak. The mutant's husband, an extremely powerful telepath, wants revenge, and he's willing to kill every cop in the world to get it.

Ridley has set the stage for a very interesting character arc (assuming he writes another book in this series). Soledad could be on her way to redemption or tragedy, the answer lying in the questions raised by her final shocking acts in the book. The drawback, of course, is that Ridley seems intent on selling this to Hollywood, via animation or any avenue available, so the project may very well die on the shelf. In the meantime, Ridley has given us a story where we root for the redemption of the hero, not just her success, in a world as complex and twisted as reality, as fanciful as anything Hollywood could dream.