Vicious

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Vicious (Villains No. 1)

V.E. Schwab

364 pages | Published by Tor Books

The Set Up: Victor and Eli are med-school roommates, ready to start on their theses. When Eli declares that his thesis will be on ExtraOrdinaries - people rumored to have superhuman abilities - Victor, not to be outdone, asks why stop there? Why not try and create an EO? Their experiments end in disaster, and ten years later we find Victor breaking out of prison and searching for Eli to get his revenge.

My first five star read of the year! I’m not surprised, based on what I’ve heard about this book and I’m only sad I hadn’t picked it up sooner.

I’m going to be thinking about this story and these characters for a LONG time. Between Victor’s tenacity and calm logic and Eli’s self-assuredness and religious zeal, they had such an interesting anti-hero and villain dynamic.

The chapters were often very short, so between that and the timeline jumps the book was super addictive. Part One sticks pretty close to Victor, and once Part Two gives some more context for the rest of the crew, the story gets that much more layered.

All in all I want to SCREAM I enjoyed this book and its twisty, macabre, dark academia vibes!!!