Top 5 bookish villains

It’s possibly because I read this so recently… but holy what the hell happened to Tate James that she wrote such a crazy, psychotic character. Chase Lockhart is seriously messed up. In a really, really, evil, bad way.

7th Circle blurb:

Five years ago, I masterminded the infamous massacre of the Tri-state Timberwolves.

The streets outside the Wolves HQ ran red with the blood of the old guard, and not one of those members loyal to my father were spared mercy. Not a single one.

I let the media twist and distort the story. My new recruits eagerly proved themselves in spreading false news, in covering our tracks. To the general public, the Tri-State Timberwolves were extinct.

But that couldn’t have been further from the truth. We changed, we grew, we evolved and came out stronger than ever. Now, I live, eat, sleep and breathe Timberwolves. I’ll do anything to keep my empire safe and thriving. To keep the people depending on me safe.

So, what do I do, when it’s my own weakness that places us all in danger? When I let sex cloud my judgment, and my people pay the price?

Simple. Kill the distractions.

I’m called Hades for a reason, after all.

Speaking of psychopaths, Jonathon is basically the YA version of Chase Lockhart. I think the part that upsets me the most with him is the whole incest storyline. It was bad and icky and I did not like it.

City of Bones blurb:

When fifteen-year-old Clary Fray heads out to the Pandemonium Club in New York City, she hardly expects to witness a murder ― much less a murder committed by three teenagers covered with strange tattoos and brandishing bizarre weapons. Then the body disappears into thin air. It’s hard to call the police when the murderers are invisible to everyone else and when there is nothing ― not even a smear of blood ― to show that a boy has died. Or was he a boy?

This is Clary’s first meeting with the Shadowhunters, warriors dedicated to ridding the earth of demons. It’s also her first encounter with Jace, a Shadowhunter who looks a little like an angel and acts a lot like a jerk. Within twenty-four hours Clary is pulled into Jace’s world with a vengeance when her mother disappears and Clary herself is attacked by a demon. But why would demons be interested in ordinary mundanes like Clary and her mother? And how did Clary suddenly get the Sight? The Shadowhunters would like to know…

I debated putting Tamlin from ACOTAR in this spot, but I talk about that series so much already. So I decided on King Midas instead. And he has a lot of similarities to Tam-Tam anyway. Villains that hold something over the MC to use against them emotionally or physically is really just so abhorrent. And there are SO MANY of these types of characters in literature.

Gild blurb:

The fae abandoned this world to us. And the ones with power rule.

Gold.

Gold floors, gold walls, gold furniture, gold clothes. In Highbell, in the castle built into the frozen mountains, everything is made of gold.

Even me.

King Midas rescued me. Dug me out of the slums and placed me on a pedestal. I’m called his precious. His favored. I’m the woman he Gold-Touched to show everyone that I belong to him. To show how powerful he is. He gave me protection, and I gave him my heart. And even though I don’t leave the confines of the palace, I’m safe.

Until war comes to the kingdom and a deal is struck.

Suddenly, my trust is broken. My love is challenged. And I realize that everything I thought I knew about Midas might be wrong.

Because these bars I’m kept in, no matter how gilded, are still just a cage. But the monsters on the other side might make me wish I’d never left.

This is possibly an unpopular opinion, but I truly think that Catherine and Heathcliff are the villains of Wuthering Heights. They are both such toxic characters — to each other and to everyone else around them. I really don’t understand how this is a love story, except that they really are the same. The famous line, whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same. Yes, so very true. Both souls are completely toxic and borderline psychopathic.

Wuthering Heights blurb:

“My greatest thought in living is Heathcliff. If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be… Nelly, I am Heathcliff! He’s always, always in my mind: not as a pleasure… but as my own being.”

A brooding Yorkshire tale of a love that is stronger than death, it is also a fierce vision of metaphysical passion, in which heaven and hell, nature and society, are powerfully juxtaposed. Unique, mystical, with a timeless appeal, it has become a classic of English literature.