First of all, I don't think this book was written for me. The target demographic is definitely on the very young end of YA, and sometimes this felt like I was reading a middle grade novel. For example, when there was cursing within the book, it felt out of place and unnatural, because of how young this book feels. The writing also suffers from too much telling instead of showing, and sometimes I was just confused by the writing general.

The idea behind this book, mixing Gotham city and Disney villains together, is an interesting one, but it wasn't pulled off very well IMO. While there is an interesting conversation within this novel about gentrification, I would have liked for the impacts to have been discussed in a more meaningful manner as well as the tensions between the Legacies and the Narrows. The retelling of the origin stories of The Queen of Hearts, Ursula, Maleficent, and Captain Hook were all interesting and I enjoyed how they were incorporated into a modern setting, though.

**Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for providing an e-arc in exchange for an honest review**

2.5 stars

I was really enjoying the main character's struggles and discoveries. She was a compelling, angsty teen stuck between her desire to work for the police force to keep her beloved home safe and her loyalty to her friends. There's a lot of world building, but I never learned quite where the Scar is located. The author hints its connected to a major city, but where? How does this fit with our reality?

This has the potential to be a great study of nature versus nurture, the treatment of magic and how it affects people both good and bad, the duality of good v. evil in each of us, and how consumerism is destroying the magic of the world. Great potential, right? At first, it got me thinking. Honestly, though, things fell short as concepts were never developed.

There are many scenes which were confusing in choreography. Nothing is shown to readers. A character will gasp, but instead of letting readers experience why, they're told what it is. This drew me out of the narrative as I kept waiting to find out what was happening or where a character went in a scene. I didn't experience events with the character. Occasionally, people would just show up or disappear every now and then (like Mary Elizabeth's partner).

By the end, it felt like one big set up for book 2. There was no resolution for most threads or for the main characters. Instead, I was left with more questions and feelings of annoyance.

1. What was James up to??? How did he know where everyone was and how did the serum affect him?
2. How did the serum affect Mary Elizabeth? Its hinted she was injected and she should be feeling something in about 10 minutes. Then…NOTHING.
3. If a dart caused James’s hand to shrivel up and die, and he used his body as a shield to protect Mary Elizabeth, why didn’t the rest of his body blacken and die? (and why did Mary Elizabeth volunteer to sever his hand?? I mean, ew! Let the people with actual magic do that less painfully!)
4. How did James get the blue magic in the first place?
5. What proof do they have against Kyle? It appears more in his favor than against him after the attack between Mary Elizabeth’s friends and Kyle’s goons?
6. What was the chief doing? That never wrapped up…seriously?

This book felt sloppy. I loved the concept of how these villains emerged, but that wasn’t until the very end, so the title itself is misleading. Making the change not of the characters’s choosing really makes them relatable, but I wanted more. Instead, I was left feeling like the book was just a prequel or something. Didn’t feel substantial. This entire book could have been summarized easily in the next book instead of spending 240 pages preparing for book two. Disney-Hyperion is typically great, but this book needs lot of rework to make it feel relevant and different from re-imaginings that have come before. I kept getting a "Descendants" vibe.

Maybe I was hoping for more. There are many different kinds of fairy tale retellings, namely Disney retellings, and this just wasn't the one for me. I think I realized partway through that this is supposed to be some sort of prequel to the Descendants series. Maybe it isn't, but the fact that the main characters featured are Ursula, Maleficent and Captain Hook that just screams Descendants to me—and I've never even seen the Descendants!!

The quality of writing wasn't good either. It felt aimed at a younger audience than it was supposed to be written for. Which is why I still believe this is a Descendants prequel, but I'm not even sure why it's not being marketed that way? (Like I said, I can be totally wrong.)

I wanted to like it, but it just didn't excite me the way other fairy tale retellings do.

WOW!
I absolutely love the premise of this book and the writing was absolutely superb perfect for middle grade readers as well as adults.
City of Villains meets Gotham what could go wrong? Absolutely NOTHING! Its perfect for every Disney fan young and old.
Our story starts with Mary Elizabeth, orphaned as a child and then adopted and raised by her quirky aunt. Mary Elizabeth is currently interning as a cop and wants to pursue that career as an adult even though her kind also known as Legacies are expected to do the opposite. When magic disappears from the city taking one of Marys best friends and one of her enemies. Mary Elizabeth and her boyfriend James , are figuring out how to get by in a world turned upside down when teens start going missing. . Is magic returning to Wonder? Who is behind the disappearances of teens and why?

I loved this and cant wait to read the second book!

This might be a case of mismatched reader and book. City of Villains is billed as YA but reads more like a MG novel, in my opinion. The idea behind this book is extremely clever, and while the book felt geared at a much younger crowd than I was expecting, it's quite a fast paced read, and one I'm definitely going to pass on to my daughter who will eat it up. If you aren't a fan of MG novels, you might have the same issues I did, but if you're open to something on the younger side of the genre/age spectrum, I definitely recommend giving this one a try for yourself!

It sounded like great fun from the description but I ended up bogged down without clear world-building even pretty far into the book. I generally like origin stories yet this dragged on and on with a lot of minutiae before getting to the good part of what was happening to those who were taken. I needed more character information about Ursula and Mal before they disappeared. And what was happening with James? I mean, obviously I can tell who he will be eventually, but there was some shady stuff going on before the reveal of what has been happening to the Legacies. (And what were the legacies? I'm still not sure I understand it all). Mostly, a dark story without enough intrigue to make me care.

I love Disney Villains so I was really excited that I got approved for this book. I was sadly disappointed. The writing was all over the place and wasn’t written very well. I DNFed at 20% because it just wasn’t holding my interest at all. This also didn’t give off Gotham vibes to me, more like Zootopia like everyone else has mentioned. I really enjoy the Disney Twisted Tales books but this was a miss for me.

Thank you so much to Disney-Hyperion and NetGalley for a digital ARC of this title in exchange for an honest review. As always, all opinions expressed are my own.
Quick description: City of Villians follows a girl named Mary as she goes on her first case as a police intern. The book is set in a world recently deprived of magic where there are lots of new mysteries and crimes.
My opinion: I was honestly not a huge fan of this book. I did DNFed it at around 30%. I was very confused by the magic system and I wasn't connecting with the characters. I did like the mystery aspect of it though. I might have liked it more or understood the magic system more as I read on but I just felt the book wasn't going to be a good fit for me. Still, this might be a good fit for a Disney fan looking for an urban fantasy with mystery.

Thanks to the publisher for providing an eARC of City of Villains in exchange for an honest review.

I don't know who the audience for this could possibly be. The writing is all showing no telling which is typical of younger YA/middle grade but the presence of swearing and a few more adult conversations means this can't really be marketed at readers in that age demographic. A lot of this book suffers from a similar inbetweeness that keeps it from forming a strong identity or audience. We're in a world with magic that recently died and a fairytale-esque social hierarchy, but our protagonist also references Love Island so apparently we're in a modern day alternate earth. A lot of the names are comically fantastical, but then we also have characters casually named "Lucas" and "Kyle". Immersion here was near impossible because the world was so, so shaking that every time I thought I had a handle on the world, tone, or demographic, I'd get a jarring reminder of something to the contrary.

The ARC was a very very rough read where the story sometimes got lost BUT I liked it nonetheless. Hoping to read it again when it comes out to see what I might’ve missed.

Such a cool retelling! It was fun seeing how our beloved villains became what we know them to be. Mary Elizabeth is our heroine and as the various known characters are introduced or developed into the known characters, I can’t seem to figure out who Mary will be. It was fun as I was reading trying to guess who was who.

As I said, because the arc was so rough I really can’t say how well the story flows since for this draft it was glitchy. But what I did read, it was very enjoyable and will definitely want to know what goes on in Book 2!

You think the Disney Villains are wicked? Just wait until you see them in this first installment of the City of Villains series set to the tune of Gotham City. This story is in the point of view of teenager Mary Elizabeth Heart (i.e. The Queen of Hearts) and follows her and her friends as they face a world without magic.

At first I was very excited about all the potential this book held. I practically swooned when I heard our Disney Villains would be put into a scene like Gotham City; in fact, I was prepared to just be chilling like a villain by kicking my feet up and devouring this book. Unfortunately, I soon found this book wasn't all that I hoped it would be. The beginning was extremely hard to get through, and as someone from the U.S. who just finished out an exhausting election year, I was extremely not interested in the abundance of politics in the start of this book--I'm not even sure the three factions of political "parties" were necessary to the story. The author spent so much time trying to world-build and cram as much information into the beginning as possible that I found decidedly not interested and overall kind of confused. I would have much preferred, as a reader, that I learn all of these things as I read (and as the plot thickened). Something else I had an issue with: some of our characters fell flat. As I said above, this book had so much potential and I wish the book had done more with our villains in terms of character development so we could have gotten the most of our of this book. I hold onto the hope that any sequels that are published give them some fantastic character arcs as well as hopefully make the plot a little easier to follow.

I digress, while this series has a lot of room for improvement, I will say that once I got through the cram-session that was the beginning, I started to enjoy the book and it was a nice, quick, and easy read. While this isn't necessarily an upper YA book, I do think middle grade readers to young YA teens may enjoy reading it. For parent/guardians needing a content reference, the romance was pretty PG and the cursing was not a huge deal, although a bit out of place.

I need a television series now please!

That's it. Villains, intrigue, deception, plot, world building, strong characters you find yourself rooting for?

It's all here, folks.

Disney Villains meets Gotham? Sign me up!.......unfortunately this book did not meet the expectations I had. The story is based around Mary Elizabeth Heart, an intern at a police department, her criminal boyfriend James (aka Captain Hook), her missing best friend Ursula, and the other missing girl Mally (Maleficent). This story is essentially a police procedural mystery mixed with Disney Villain origin stories. The biggest issue I had was the way the story was told, it was definitely more explained then show, and it got a bit off putting the more I read. I stuck through the book because it has all the elements I normally love and I was determined to see it to the end. The entire magic system, world building, class system, just was a mess and honestly they really throw you in with so much explaining in the first few chapters. The story is advertised as “dark and edgy YA” but it honestly comes off more like a middle grade book with splashes of a little bit of cursing and a little bit of romance, but it definitely is not as “gritty” as I initially thought it would be. The thing about this is, the entire plot and world has so much potential, you could definitely make this an amazing gritty dark mystery with magic, but it came off more juvenile than I had anticipated. Mary is struggling to deal with her identity as part of the Legacy, also known as the “bad” kids ( aka families in the world who use to have magic, so think of essentially the big characters, in her case, I’m assuming Queen of Hearts), and her ambition to be a police officer. Her character has a tragic past , definitely like Dick Grayson more than Bruce Wayne vibes I got from her. She’s trying to solve a mystery and along the way finds that things are not what they seem and the mystery is bigger than even her. The plot is okay and the mystery was fine, I just felt that Mary was a bit juvenile for her supposed age and occupation, and found some of her decisions “meh”. Overall, this book was okay, but it could have been so much more. I’d definitely recommend it for readers who are about 12-15 age group. The book ends on a cliffhanger as this is the first book in the series, but the initial mystery is solved by the end of the first book. If your a fan of Disney’s Descedants or any kind of Disney reimagining this could definitely be up your alley, so give it a try!

*Thank you Netgalley and Disney Publishing Worldwide for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

This book was enjoyable and a great diversion from real life. I know plenty of teens who will enjoy it. Perfect for teens who grew up watching Disney movies and are ready for something a bit more grown up.

DNF at 5%
I was really excited when I got approved for this book, but when I started to read it I realized it really wasn't something I'm interested in. I think it would be great for the younger side of YA and middle grade, but it really does not appeal to me. The book itself seems like a great idea, but as someone who is an adult and does not read a lot of middle grade or younger YA, this didn't appeal to me.

Thank you to Netgalley and Disney-Hyperion for providing me a copy of this book for review.

City of Villains was a fresh take on some of Disney's most beloved characters. Part police procedural, it portrays main character, Mary Elizabeth Heart, as she is given the chance to solve the case of missing teenager and fellow student Mally Saint. As she does, she learns there is more to her world than meets the eye.

This book was a bit on the juvenile side, and I think younger Disney fans will enjoy this more than older ones despite some pretty dark content. The writing was...okay, but definitely simple and clearly aimed at a young audience. Loyal Disney fans will enjoy this (I certainly did), but it may fall flat for older readers. I am looking forward to the sequel and would love to know where the story goes from here.

This is another interesting take on existing Disney characters for a new Universe. Mary Heart was with her closest friend when magic died. Now her whole community lives around the Scars of a world that was filled with magic and wish granting. The children of those that died or disappeared after the traumatic event call themselves Legacies. The are finding themselves and their community pushed to the side as rich families looking to add land and power and wealth buy taking over legacy land. Mary works for the local police force as an intern but is then given her first partner and her first case, trying to locate a missing legacy. When Mary's best friend Ursula disappears she is even more determined to find out who is kidnapping legacies in her neighborhood.

I instantly knew I needed to read this. With Maleficient on the cover and the tagline "Disney villains meets Gotham". My two favorite things colliding.

Mary Elizabeth Heart interns at a police station and gets put on a missing person's case. She is caught between those who once had magic and those who desperately want to bring it back.

I wanted to love this book so much. But I really struggled to get into it. The format of the ebook on Netgalley made it difficult to read and it was slow to start. I plan to give this a second chance, but in audiobook format, once it is released. It is part Disney and part police procedural.

3 stars for now, but I am hoping to revisit this once I have been able to listen to it.

What a great book.

City of Villains gives us the backstory or origin tale on many of the villains and characters we love from other Disney tales. Similar to the movie Maleficent, it gives an alternate perspective and explains why and how they became the villains we know today. Some of the references were obvious, others became clear the farther one got into the story. The story follows Mary Elizabeth Heart, a teenager in Monarch City working as an intern in the police department. Students begin to go missing, and she is assigned to investigate along with a young officer named Bella. The case initially seems straightforward, but it goes much deeper than expected as they work to discover what is truly happening to the missing students.

Magic (and its disappearance) is a driving force of many of the events in the book, and a large source of conflict between different groups in the novel (i.e. Magicalists vs. Naturalists). I really like how this book ended, the line “Magic is back” is a powerful closer. I feel like the author Estelle Laure ended it at such a point that it creates a really good opening for the next installment. I look forward to seeing what will happen and what other characters will be introduced in the next book.

I would recommend this to young adult audiences and above, it’s not really suited towards middle-grade readers. Fans of Descendants or Zootopia will enjoy this book. It mentions Gotham in the description, but it doesn’t really have the same mood. Any diehard Disney fan will love all the nods in the book.

Thank you to NetGalley and Disney Publishing for my free e-ARC of this book. This in no way affected my review, and everything written reflects my honest, unbiased opinion.

I think there are definitely some clever moments here, but I think it's definitely more Descendants than Gotham. Mally Saint? Really?