And to my husband Dean, whose adventurous life informs these books more than he realizes. Chapter One “Why do all superheroes have to look like Superman?” Vivian Kineally asked as she studied the interior of her nephew’s comic book. She was sitting on the stoop outside her apartment building, her eleven-year-old nephew Kyle beside her. The sun cast its warm rays on the concrete steps and illuminated Kyle’s latest hand-drawn effort. In the week that Vivian had lived in Portland, the sun had been out every day. She had no idea how the city had gotten its rainy, gloomy reputation. “He doesn’t look like Superman,” Kyle said, craning his neck over the double-page spread that rested on Vivian’s knees. “Yes he does.” Vivian traced the hero’s chin, feeling the pen marks beneath her finger. “See? He’s got the same lantern jaw that Siegel and Shuster gave the original in Nineteen-thirty-eight. He’s even got the dimple in his chin.” She loved that dimple. She had always thought— and never admitted aloud—that the Siegel and Shuster Superman, the original, was the handsomest man she had ever seen.
