Leigh Bardugo told us all to read Long Live Evil by Sarah Rees Brennan, so I read it and was pleased to find that one of my favorite authors did not at all lead me astray. This fantasy tale has a framing device that’s entirely its own and a teasing tone that reveals an incredibly moving story as the book goes on.
Rae has cancer, and she is not going to get better. At only 20 years old, she’s dying. Her favorite source of comfort is her sister, coming to her hospital room to read her stories from their favorite fantasy series, Time of Iron. Her sister’s favorite character is the pretty, perfect heroine, but Rae’s favorite character is always the villain. One night, a mysterious stranger appears in her hospital room and offers her a magical bargain. She will be transported to the fantasy realm of her favorite book series, and if she can find the Flower of Life and Death, which only blooms once a year, she will come back to her earthly body and live a healthy life.
When Rae wakes up in a fictional land that she’s only experienced in books, she finds herself in a healthy body, but the body of the series’ villainess, on the eve of her execution. Rae has to use her cunning, and the character’s natural wicked abilities, to build herself an evil team to ensure her own survival. There is a homicidal maniac who is her guard, a lady’s maid who gets very comfortable with wielding an axe, a roguish playboy with a terrible reputation that belies his golden heart, and a moody yet honorable knight. Not to mention the pure, gorgeous heroine who is Rae’s character’s sworn nemesis. It is a constant wave of intrigue, with danger lurking in every chapter.
The wonderfully whimsical premise turns wonderfully wicked within the first few chapters, and it’s a sheer delight. The story is imbued with cleverness and consistently makes astute observations about the beauty and truth of reading these kinds of stories.
“Everyone who thinks books will make women date assholes underestimates us. If stories hypnotize people, why isn’t everybody terrified movies will turn boys into drag-racing assassins? I don’t want to fix the guy, I want to watch the murder show.”
The book is the first in a series, with an incredibly sassy in tone that is so fun to read. The protagonist’s observations about society, writing, fiction, and fantasy are so poignant but often also hilarious.
Long Live Evil unabashedly embraces villainy, showing humanity even in the darkest of deeds, and explores the sociology that forces that evil to be necessary.
“Don’t listen to stories encouraging you to be good, telling you to shine in a filthy world and patiently endure suffering. Screw suffering. It’s too hard to be good. Do the easy thing. Do the evil thing. Grasp whatever you desire in your greedy bloodstained hands.”
The characters are all villains in their own ways, and each is a perfectly crafted piece of the story. Rae, the protagonist, is often wrong, makes mistakes, and does things out of pure self-interest, but you root for her anyway. Her sociopathic guard, Key, is the best character in the entire book, as far as I’m concerned, despite his truly enormous body count. I’m rooting for Key, and readers are supposed to root for Key, even though he’s clearly deranged.
Due to the mixing of characters from the “real” world and this fantasy realm, Long Live Evil blends a magical world and modern references, often used with excellent comedic timing. At one point Rae is telling her new friends all about Lady Rachel and Lord Ross and the question of potential infidelity in their love story, and I cackled out loud.
There are magnificent plot twists waiting for readers in this book, including one at the end that I realized later that I should have seen coming, but fully didn’t. The author is just as tricky as her characters, and I am here for it.
This book is so good that I’m deeply irritated I didn’t write it myself, which is always a thought that crosses my mind while reading something truly remarkable. With this book, the thought came to me in the very first chapter.
The pacing was not perfect. It took me a little while to truly launch into the story, but only for a few chapters. And then things really take off. This book compensates well for a start where readers might be unsure what’s going on with wonderful characters and a genuinely delightful tone. Long Live Evil is overall an excellent reading experience, and I can’t wait for the next in the series.
Writing: 4.5
Spice: 0.5
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