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A review by fromjuliereads
If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
I was already really nervous to read this book because of the hype, and now I am nervous to post my review...
I don't think this was a bad book. I just can't say it was for me. There were too many aspects of the novel that just didn't work for me. I'm going to attempt to explain my thoughts.
- the entire plot was predictable to me. There weren't really any twists that I didn't see coming in the murder mystery. It's quite clear very quickly who is going to be murdered, and I guessed who had done it pretty quickly after. It would have been nice to have a bit more mystery to it.
- the pretentiousness of the language. Okay, I understand that this is part of dark academia. But no one in their 20s uses the phrases "elite artistic and philological sodalities" and then turns around to curse and use Shakespeare quotes. The dichotomy of language was really weird to me. Especially because I also found a lot of grammatical errors... hard to sound pretentious when you mess up using 'than' instead of 'that.' A couple times it sounded a bit like a first year university student trying to cram in big words for extra points... and then she drops that part way through.
- alright. I enjoyed Shakespeare in my studies. I have read quite a few of his more well known plays and sonnets, and enjoyed them. (I am not a Shakespeare fanatic though.) But the entire blocks of copied text from his plays were a bit much for me. I liked when some quotes were sprinkled throughout, but the requoting of entire monologues and scenes? It was a lot. (And idk if it was just me or the text I had, but some of the direct quotes were missing proper line breaks in their quotations and it REALLY BUGGED ME.)
- let's chat about the characters. I didn't like any of them... HAHA. I am not generally a big fan of morally grey characters, and that's basically what all of them are. Seemingly chaotic good or chaotic evil. But so many of them weren't fully developed. We get no explanation or back story for why Richard suddenly becomes violent and belligerent. Wren and Filippa are barely developed, where they are both forgotten multiple times in the story (and it is repeated over and over that Filippa is forgettable). I think Filippa is the only character I came close to liking but I didn't have enough information about her... The female characters are just underdeveloped stereotypes and it was so frustrating.
- I cannot speak to the LGBTQ+ rep in the book. But the persistent internalized homophobia was difficult to read. I understand that this is something a lot of people struggle with, and it should be discussed. But I think we have passed the point where books that have it throughout are praised and hyped...
- perhaps the point that will get me the most slack on this review, I didn't like the ending. I guess it was mostly because I didn't care about the characters at that point.
Well this is really long now... I will say that I enjoyed the formatting like a play!
I don't think this was a bad book. I just can't say it was for me. There were too many aspects of the novel that just didn't work for me. I'm going to attempt to explain my thoughts.
- the entire plot was predictable to me. There weren't really any twists that I didn't see coming in the murder mystery. It's quite clear very quickly who is going to be murdered, and I guessed who had done it pretty quickly after. It would have been nice to have a bit more mystery to it.
- the pretentiousness of the language. Okay, I understand that this is part of dark academia. But no one in their 20s uses the phrases "elite artistic and philological sodalities" and then turns around to curse and use Shakespeare quotes. The dichotomy of language was really weird to me. Especially because I also found a lot of grammatical errors... hard to sound pretentious when you mess up using 'than' instead of 'that.' A couple times it sounded a bit like a first year university student trying to cram in big words for extra points... and then she drops that part way through.
- alright. I enjoyed Shakespeare in my studies. I have read quite a few of his more well known plays and sonnets, and enjoyed them. (I am not a Shakespeare fanatic though.) But the entire blocks of copied text from his plays were a bit much for me. I liked when some quotes were sprinkled throughout, but the requoting of entire monologues and scenes? It was a lot. (And idk if it was just me or the text I had, but some of the direct quotes were missing proper line breaks in their quotations and it REALLY BUGGED ME.)
- let's chat about the characters. I didn't like any of them... HAHA. I am not generally a big fan of morally grey characters, and that's basically what all of them are. Seemingly chaotic good or chaotic evil. But so many of them weren't fully developed.
- I cannot speak to the LGBTQ+ rep in the book. But the persistent internalized homophobia was difficult to read. I understand that this is something a lot of people struggle with, and it should be discussed. But I think we have passed the point where books that have it throughout are praised and hyped...
- perhaps the point that will get me the most slack on this review, I didn't like the ending. I guess it was mostly because I didn't care about the characters at that point.
Well this is really long now... I will say that I enjoyed the formatting like a play!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing
Moderate: Addiction, Blood, Body shaming, Bullying, Death, Drug use, Eating disorder, Emotional abuse, Grief, Homophobia, Mental illness, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexism, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Violence, and Vomit
Minor: Suicide