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Top Ten Villains in Books

4th October 2016 By Julianne 1 Comment

I could not resist this topic as I love a book villain, especially one who is a little bit sympathetic or is extremely clever!

Top Ten Villains in Books
 
 

1. Voldemort, from the Harry Potter series – I thought I’d kick off with a classic and couldn’t resist putting Voldemort on the list. He’s got it all. He’s physically frightening, creepy, wants to kill the lead character, wants to oppress all Muggles, you name it, if it’s evil, Voldy wants to do it. Plus his middle name is Elvis in the French translation, which is très drôle, non?

2. President Alma Coin, from the Hunger Games trilogy – I know Snow is more iconic but Coin is ultimately more cunning, and therefore more interesting to me. I love it when a villain appears to be the good one but has a self-serving plan.

3. Speaking of self-serving, Piper Greenmantle in Maggie Stiefvater’s The Raven Cycle is the queen of selfishness. She does whatever suits her in the moment without really thinking about it and that makes her much more scary then any of the other potential villains in this series.

4. Another villain that appears to be ‘the good one’ is Silarial, the Queen of the Seelie Court in Holly Black’s Modern Fairy Tale series. The Seelie Court make a good show of being genteel but behind all that prettiness they’re child-snatching monsters.

5. The Queen in The Sin-Eater’s Daughter by Melinda Salisbury has so much power she gets away with only the thinnest veneer of civility, which is quickly brushed away when things don’t go as she had planned.

6. Opal Koboi, from the Artemis Fowl series by Eoin Colfer, is probably my favourite villain on this list. She pretends to be an upstanding businessfairy, but is actually deliciously evil and brilliantly cruel. It’s so much fun to both see her put Artemis and the others in danger and get her comeuppance.

7. Opal seized power from her father, and another favourite villain who grasped power when she had the chance to get it is Circe, from Libba Bray’s Gemma Doyle trilogy. She was the girl who wasn’t gifted, who could only access power when her best friend allowed it, and when there was the risk that she would never be able to wield it again, she took matters into her own hands. I have a lot of sympathy for her – even though she does terrible things to get that power.

8. That’s enough individuals – now let’s move on to a villainous organisation. Rush Recruitment is the big bad of the Hobson and Choi series by Nick Bryan (my boyfriend – the fourth book is out today so I couldn’t resist including them on my list), an evil recruitment agency/human trafficking organisation. They’re genuinely terrifying, even though so far they haven’t appeared that frequently, because they have their fingers in so many pies and commit such appalling acts.

8. In the marvellous historical fantasy Sorcerer to the Crown, by Zen Cho, the villain is really institutional prejudice. Everything would have gone a lot differently for the main characters had they not had to deal with racism and sexism throughout their lives – and a good part of the plot involves them fighting it efficiently and hilariously, in order to save the day.

10. Similarly, but more extreme, the villain in Only Ever Yours by Louise O’Neill is the entire goddamn system. Everything is hopeless for frieda and isabel because all the odds have been stacked against them. And that’s the most frightening thing of all.

Let me know in the comments if any of your favourite villains are on my list, and if you’ve participated in this week’s Top Ten Tuesday.

Top Ten Tuesday was created and is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

Filed Under: Recommendation Lists Tagged With: book chat, books, Top Ten Tuesday

Reading Challenges 2015 Wrap Up

2nd January 2016 By Julianne Leave a Comment

I decided not to do any reading challenges in 2014. For the full story, see this post.

However, in 2014, a lot changed in my life and I started reading more frequently, so I decided to sign up for some reading challenges yet again! I decided to stick to more relaxed challenges only. I went through the Novel Challenges list and discounted any challenges with rules that were too strict. I skipped challenges that required me to stick to one goal as I wanted to be able to challenge myself more if I was doing well.

I hoped to stick to the spirit of 2014 – reading for fun – and to try to resist the temptation to create a spreadsheet! “Let’s see how long THAT lasts…” I said, and I did resist for the entire year! It’s okay, I made a lot of spreadsheets for work. I still love spreadsheets.

So, how did I do?

British Books Challenge

DONE – I beat the goal of reading 12 books by British authors in 2015!

I last attempted the British Books Challenge in 2011 and I managed 7 books out of the 12 I originally planned to read. As I found it so hard I avoided it in subsequent years, but for 2015 it was being run by the wonderful Michelle at Fluttering Butterflies who is a) lovely and b) persistent, so I found it impossible to resist!

I also vlogged the British Books Challenge, which I think helped a lot as it encouraged me to read enough books to talk about in each vlog!

 

British Books I Read In 2015:

1. Five Children and It, by E. Nesbit
2. Trouble, by Non Pratt
3. The Bookshop Book, by Jen Campbell
4. Beware The Dwarfs, by Terri Paddock
5. Gypsy Girl, by Kathryn James
6. Elizabeth is Missing, by Emma Healey
7. Remix, by Non Pratt
8. The Sin Eater’s Daughter, by Melinda Salisbury
9. Wintersmith, by Terry Pratchett
10. The Girl on the Train, by Paula Hawkins
11. The Lost and the Found, by Cat Clarke
12. The Year of the Rat, by Clare Furniss
13. Crow Mountain, by Lucy Inglis
14. Have a Little Faith, by Candy Harper
15. Keep the Faith, by Candy Harper
16. Lorali, by Laura Dockrill
17. Counting Stars, by Keris Stainton
18. Killing the Dead, by Marcus Sedgwick
19. Return to the Secret Garden, by Holly Webb
20. The Wolf Wilder, by Katherine Rundell
21. Witch Wars, by Sibéal Pounder, illustrated by Laura Ellen Anderson
22. Cuckoo Song, by Frances Hardinge
23. The End of Mr Y, by Scarlett Thomas
24. Lobsters, by Tom Ellen and Lucy Ivison

Dive into Diversity Reading Challenge

Dive Into Diversity Reading Challenge


As this has no specific goal I’m not sure how I did..! However, although I read a few novels with LGBT themes, I didn’t read many by non-white authors. I think I need to make a serious effort with this next year.

Fairytale Retelling Reading Challenge

 

The Daily Prophecy

I don’t think I managed to read a single Fairytale Retelling. Eep.

2015 Classics Challenge

I got talked into this one on Twitter, and I’d already read one book that qualified at the time and had another lined up! But then I kind of stopped…

1. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by Frank L. Baum
2. Five Children and It, by E Nesbit
3. Forever, by Judy Blume

#FinishItFeb

DONE – though I only read two of the previously-unread Artemis Fowl books in February, it took me until July to finish the series!

The TBR Double Dog Dare

DONE – I  only read books I already owned until April 1st with the following exceptions:

  • books for my book club
  • books I get sent for review that I REALLY want
  • books for #FinishItFeb
How did you do with your reading challenges last year?

Filed Under: Challenges Tagged With: book chat, books, reading challenges

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Hi! I'm Julianne and this is my book blog. Click my picture to read more about me.

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