Vicious (Villains #1) V.E. Schwab - Review

‘Victor and Eli started out as college roommates--brilliant, arrogant, lonely boys who recognized the same ambition in each other. A shared interest in adrenaline, near-death experiences and seemingly supernatural events reveals an intriguing possibility: that under the right conditions, someone could develop extraordinary abilities. But when their thesis moves from the academic to the experimental, things go horribly wrong.

Ten years later, Victor breaks out of prison, determined to catch up to his old friend (now foe), aided by a young girl with a stunning ability. Meanwhile, Eli is on a mission to eradicate every other super-powered person that he can find--aside from his sidekick, an enigmatic woman with an unbreakable will. Armed with terrible power on both sides, driven by the memory of betrayal and loss, the arch-nemeses have set a course for revenge--but who will be left alive at the end?’

Going into Vicious, I was unsure of how easily I would immerse myself in the series. I’ve been reading a lot of fantasy recently and even though the basis of this book intrigued me, I wasn’t sure how smooth it would be to read a different genre. To begin with, I found it a little difficult to fall into the rhythm of the story and to get used to the new writing style/how the perspectives shifted back and forward.

However, it didn’t take too long until I was invested in the story and I managed to fly through the novel much quicker than I originally expected. One of the elements that I loved most about this book is that even though Eli and Victor are both bad people with terrible morals, the style of the novel makes sure that you always slightly sympathise with at least one of them and find something relatable about the honesty of the characters. Neither of them is a perfect character who can do no wrong. In the beginning, the writer makes it known that Victor is overly jealous of Eli and his studies/discoveries always make Victor feel less accomplished, meaning that he constantly tries to one-up him. Eli has a very judgemental, self-loathing complex where he struggles to accept who he is after conducting his experiment. Whilst the two of them convey toxic traits and personalities, these small hints keep you hooked on the characters enough to not entirely despise them. Both of them are also quite charismatic in their mannerisms which also makes them likeable in this sense. Even though I see the two of them as complete psychopaths, I like that there’s this sense of relatability because whoever related to a perfect character?

I would say that the character I liked the most in this book was probably Sydney. I loved how you start off not knowing anything about her and bit by bit, throughout each of the flashbacks, you learn more about her backstory and the trauma that got her to where she was in the moment she met Victor. I also liked how the fact she had met Eli was a plot twist incorporated into the story that wasn’t sprung on the reader immediately. It was an intriguing extra detail that hooked the reader’s attention just a little more. The story itself had many of these little hooks that drew you in slowly but surely. I started off not entirely gripped by this book if I’m being completely truthful, but each and every one of these hooks got me and I didn’t realise just how much until I completely finished the rest of the book one night without putting it down.

Sydney was definitely a character whom I felt had a lot of depth that perhaps isn’t noticed straight away. Her entire life she compares herself to her sister’s standards. Her looks, personalities and mannerisms. Sydney seemed to view her newfound abilities as a way to set herself apart from her sister, but I think that you can easily see the differences in their personalities. Sydney is incredibly intelligent for her age and she’s compassionate which is something I see severely lacking in Serena’s demeanour. I can easily say that I’m most excited about Sydney’s character development within the sequel compared to anyone else’s. I’m intrigued to see how she copes with how the first book ended and where she will grow with her ability from thereon.

This book conveys a message about curiosity and envy. Victor clearly envied his friend so badly that it ended up leading towards what would likely be both of their demises. The two of them attempted to commit suicide in order to prove Eli’s thesis, whilst also causing the deaths of many, many other people. The result of both of these emotions in the hands of Victor is what set off the chain reaction of events leading to the end of the book and ultimately hurting a variety of people along the way. At the same time, it also conveys a very important perspective on the absence of fear in life and how it affects the way these individuals go about daily life. Victor and Eli had no problem trying to kill each other once the factor of fear had been erased. In fact, my favourite quote from the book itself portrays this perfectly.

“The absence of pain led to an absence of fear, and the absence of fear led to a disregard for consequence.”

With how this book ended, I’m eager to start on the second to see where this story leads. The only reason that I wouldn’t rate it 5/5 stars is purely because I thought the ending was a little predictable, however the concept of the story itself was quite original, in my opinion, and the style in which it was written only added to its uniqueness.