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A review by frogknitting
If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio
1.5
I've decided that this book is significantly better if you imagine that everything that happens is caused by black mold in their dorm. They continued to say, "What's wrong with you?" It's the mold!
I really, really wanted to try to give this book a chance, but from the beginning I couldn't stop thinking about The Secret History. This is like the Kidz Bop version of it: a book that takes the basic structure of it but lacks the depth. It was entirely too long and yet it didn't have nearly the amount of time to go into what it needed to to succeed.
Though Richard isn't necessarily a carbon copy of Bunny, he takes his worst elements (as well as Henry's worst traits) and makes that his personality. No redeeming qualities, whereas I think Bunny had some? (I'm going to be honest, it's been a LONG time since I read TSH) At least, he was a lot better fleshed out. All of the characters in this were wholly one-dimensional, just being introduced at the beginning by name (all seven of them, by the way, so you have to fully know these people as well asRichard Oliver knows them). It feels like a draft, a book that could've been decent if it had only been fleshed out significantly more and deviated from its inspiration. As it is, it has characters that are mere caricatures of the TSH characters. Characters do things in this book because they're supposed to, not because it would be in line with anything we've seen of them thus far (and with SEVEN characters, we haven't seen much....) Oliver and James's personalities radically change throughout the book, from two guys who are just trying to get an education and feel connected to their classmates to a guy who's weirdly obsessed with Meredith and a man who's going absolutely insane with guilt, but not in the way that he would have, if we follow his character arc. It might also be the black mold.
I genuinely want to write this review without consistently mentioning The Secret History, but I feel it's impossible. The draw of it is that it takes real moral questions and grapples with them, not letting plot rule it, but rather, letting the characters' musings take over. I know that's a personal preference of mine, but this was very much a show not tell book, where you simply were told what was happening and had to go with it. They're all going insane and upset because they don't rescue their dying friend — his head is caving in, he wouldn't have survived anyway! Yes, James killed him, but that's not the real moral dilemma here. Speaking of which, it was incredibly, unspeakably predictable. I thought maybe James would be killed by Richard, who would then be killed by Oliver, but no. It happened exactly as you'd think it would.
The other characters: I have gripes with them because of how poorly written they are. Yes, it's the memory of a man ten years later, and yes, they're definitely not supposed to be good people, but there was really no need for a lot of it. A lot of people have mentioned Alexander, the only openly queer character (besides James and Oliver, if you'd count them), consistently makes rape jokes and they're brushed aside. No, the author shouldn't punish their characters for not acting 100% morally, but idk, I just feel like maybe she should have just cut this out. It really doesn't add anything, except for her predatory view of queer men. The women are also very flat — tons of slut shaming, the woman who's there solely to serve everyone else, etc. etc., and the thing is that I wouldn't necessarily have a problem with that through (I keep typing Richard) Oliver's point of view if it was only refuted in reality. She tries to write an unreliable narrator without contradicting or casting doubt on what he says. The sisters were a real issue for me as well. His sister's eating disorder was used as a plot device just for him to have to clean and get tons of clues. It was underdeveloped and thrown in there for convenience. If you really, really wanted it to work better, he could've had that job the entire time (I know that's also a TSH rip off, Richard being poorer than the others and having to work, but we're well past that) and it would've fit in a bit more naturally.
There's just a lot in this book, and none of it is developed particularly well. The consistent Shakespeare quotes were annoying, I agree, although I think near the beginning they were used more sparingly and better. It seemed scrambled together, meaning to meet a deadline, and there were no explanations for many of their actions beyond 1. plot convenience or 2. black mold. 1.5 stars because, as much as I've complained, the prose in the first half wasn't horrible and seemed pretty standard for YA, making it not a complete burden to get through.
I really, really wanted to try to give this book a chance, but from the beginning I couldn't stop thinking about The Secret History. This is like the Kidz Bop version of it: a book that takes the basic structure of it but lacks the depth. It was entirely too long and yet it didn't have nearly the amount of time to go into what it needed to to succeed.
Though Richard isn't necessarily a carbon copy of Bunny, he takes his worst elements (as well as Henry's worst traits) and makes that his personality. No redeeming qualities, whereas I think Bunny had some? (I'm going to be honest, it's been a LONG time since I read TSH) At least, he was a lot better fleshed out. All of the characters in this were wholly one-dimensional, just being introduced at the beginning by name (all seven of them, by the way, so you have to fully know these people as well as
I genuinely want to write this review without consistently mentioning The Secret History, but I feel it's impossible. The draw of it is that it takes real moral questions and grapples with them, not letting plot rule it, but rather, letting the characters' musings take over. I know that's a personal preference of mine, but this was very much a show not tell book, where you simply were told what was happening and had to go with it.
The other characters: I have gripes with them because of how poorly written they are. Yes, it's the memory of a man ten years later, and yes, they're definitely not supposed to be good people, but there was really no need for a lot of it.
There's just a lot in this book, and none of it is developed particularly well. The consistent Shakespeare quotes were annoying, I agree, although I think near the beginning they were used more sparingly and better. It seemed scrambled together, meaning to meet a deadline, and there were no explanations for many of their actions beyond 1. plot convenience or 2. black mold. 1.5 stars because, as much as I've complained, the prose in the first half wasn't horrible and seemed pretty standard for YA, making it not a complete burden to get through.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body shaming, Alcoholism, Drug use, Sexism, and Addiction
Moderate: Eating disorder