A review by ash240
If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio

challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

HOLY SHIT IT TOOK ME SO LONG TO FINISH THIS BOOK!!! It honestly really isn't the book's fault, it just came to me during a slump and I took a long time to finish it. From the beginning I realized how similar this book is to the Secret History by Donna Tartt and how I did ultimately feel that was better written, but the end of this book definitely made up for it. I found it occasionally cringey how they only spoke in Shakespeare quotes and sometimes just remained caracatures of themselves, but there is a lot of strife and drama that occurs throughout this book.

I could never predict who killed Richard, but I am terrible at predicting any kind of a twist in a book, in addition to the love that Oliver and James shared, I'm just too stupid to initially understand, but like the both of them I seemed to understand it by the end.

I thoroughly enjoyed how this book ended ambiguously because it felt right despite the sometimes lagging plot throughout. There are definite flaws in this dark academia, the main being that I feel like I've already read it, but that is not to say that something at least remotely profound hasn't been written.