Rae, born in the 21st century, is suddenly transported to her favorite novel as the main villainess. She quickly adapts to her situation and fully embraces her role.

If you like villainess stories, isekais, and slow burns, you'll love this!

Long Live Evil is a character driven epic fantasy with compelling characters and a diverse cast. I'm usually not a fan of multiple POV books, but eventually I kept reaching for more, and I loved watching them interact with eachother!

I wish the book had better pacing; there seems to be long lulls between exciting and interesting plot points, and as much as I love slow books, it only really picked up around the 70% mark. It's a fun read and I'd still recommend it!

This was so good! There was a lot of hype surrounding this so I wanted to take some time before reviewing to think about how I really feel about this book, and the more I think about it the more I like it! There were so many hilarious moments, I love how the book didn’t take itself too seriously.

Rae, the main character, is an interesting main character. She is smart, funny, and loyal. She was frustrating at times, there were certain moments when I was screaming at her to just *think* about what was happening and not just accept things to be how they were. Her leaning into the villainess role was really amusing, however I do wish she actually did more acting and less talking. Rae was a complex character - she comes across as very humorous and confident, but behind that is anger, hurt, and fear. In the beginning of the book we find out that Rae is dying of cancer and that is something that resurfaces throughout the whole book. Brennan did a great job really convincing the reader that Rae is truly sick - some parts were even hard to read because of how real it felt.

The blend of this being in a “historical” setting but Rae still using modern language did throw me off, but it was very realistic. A lot of Isekai’s show the main character immediately blending in with their surroundings and adapting to the time period, so this one was refreshing. It also really added to the humor.

I also really liked the side characters. This book is the perfect blend of humor, romance, drama, and action. It has pain, loneliness, sadness, anger. And somehow it remains SO FUNNY!!!! I honestly wasn’t expecting the action to be that good, and truthfully, Rae didn’t really *do* much. However, the way that it was written was what made it so interesting. The tension kept building until I was on the edge of my seat and completely hooked into the story.

I unfortunately could not get into this book. The premise sounded so promising, and I had a lot of hope to love it going in, but I just found myself uninterested and confused. It seemed like the writing style and choices made to make the story like this girl got transported into this book just made it confusing.
I'm sure this book will find the right audience when it is published, it is just not for me

The Initial intro had me hooked good. I love the sisters backstory with a favorite book series and the analogies about reading. Discovering new characters and how the story comes to life. I like how the author began with a princess bride like scenario then morphed it into something along the lines of jumanji with a tangible reward for her return. To be healed and to live. Then getting dropped into the stepsister body, the beauty dipped in blood. And also right into the story before she gets executed, of all places in the time line.

It was fun to discover that Rae was not the only character replaced with someone in need of a life line. The clarity it offered about what happens to those that failed the quest and explain things like how The book works and changes. How many times has the book changed over time.

I loved the fluctuations in the storyline of the iron series as things play it was both tense and hysterical Chaotic even.

Rea is having a ball embracing the villain role with key and the cobra. Wickedly entertaining to see their antics play out.

LONG LIVE EVIL is built on a fantasy reader's dream: for one more shot at life, Rae must enter the pages of her favorite fantasy series, battle against her fictional crush, and pull off enough schemes to get to the mystical Flower of Life and Death on the one night a year it blooms. The only problem? She's dropped in as Lady Rahela, the heroine's evil stepsister, on the night before her execution and must prolong that fated death by any means necessary despite never having finished the first book. By gathering wicked allies and selling herself as indisposable by any means necessary, Rae intends to pull any wicked trick she has in order to get what she wants and make sure the story goes how she wants it to, including getting her favorite ship together.

I'll start with what I did like about this book, which is that it had a good foundation and I was invested in the cast! Key, Marius, and the Cobra were far and away my favorites, and the relationship between Marius and the Cobra and then Key's devotion to Rae? I was devouring it. I did also love Emer's POV (though I wish her romance with Lia was a bit messier and torrid, it ended up feeling so sticky soft-sweet in comparison to what Marius and the Cobra obviously have and I refuse to believe they don't). Despite what is about to follow, I think the book still has a compulsive readability to it, and if there are any sequels—I believe there are, after that ending??—I will still be in line to pick them up.

That being said. The book was not what I wanted it to be and it wasn't able to convince me that what it was doing was better. LONG LIVE EVIL is more often than not a comedy before a fantasy, and I didn't always find it amusing enough to justify a lack of engaging, sensical worldbuilding in the fantasy story Rae enters. There are a lot of tongue-in-cheek "noun of noun and noun" references, which I did chuckle at the first few times, but it was an energy that was sustained long past the point of making sense. The story really seemed to struggle between trying to be funny or irreverent and trying to be clever and profound, but I think it was slightly too self-aware to strike the correct balance and left me feeling unable to make the final leap of getting properly invested and attached to the series-in-a-series. Furthermore, I really found the cleverness wanting and would have really loved to see the idea of evil and feminine places in stories approached with depth and nuance rather than the beginning of a conversation that feminist spaces & writing have already been having and addressing for years now.

I can, at the very least, assign some of my disappointment to a strong caveat, being that I have been a lover of portal fantasies, isekai, and female-led isekai basically my entire life. I have seen some of the best and a lot of the mediocre, and on the other hand, I've also seen some of the best and a lot of the mediocre when it comes to addressing genre issues and putting spins on genre-specific tropes. So now a lot of my desire when it comes to new entries is that I need something truly clever anddifferent, and if the title of your book is LONG LIVE EVIL, I'm at least hoping for an actually evil main character (I support women's wrongs!) who supports the evil hero (which I have Things To Say About but I'll save it for now) or a far deeper dive into the roles characters are assigned which then reflect the roles we as people are assigned in our society. Stepping back, I think I wanted something far more serious and intentional, like feeling like Rae was stepping into a more understandably world-famous series akin to GOT or Wheel of Time. Though it certainly would have been more work, I feel the discussions being had in the book would have been far stronger with a more purposefully designed in-book world instead of a world that amounted to a few jokes and Tumblr posts in a high fantasy trenchcoat.

My final note is that the writing felt strangely unpolished compared to other ARCs I've received, but I do think this is something that can be cleared up with a few rounds of edits. There was a lot of repetition and clumsily crafted metaphors, and Rae's ignorance of the books could have been tweaked just a bit to lend the plot twist way more punch. I also felt that the "excerpts" in the beginning of the chapters could have done far more to worldbuild and reveal info about characters to avoid the infodumping & monologues that set the pacing back more than once. There are aspects of LONG LIVE EVIL that could be something, but I think it kept drawing back into something shallow and palatable rather than taking the leap to be something unique. I am looking forward to see if the sequels will lean into that (again! especially with that ending!!) or be more of the same.

thank you so much netgalley and orbit books for the opportunity to read an ARC of this gem!

what a fun, emotional rollercoaster this was. i adored the story, and the characters all have their special places in my heart (even the ones i’m not rooting for!). the multiple POVs helped a lot with this, i’m so glad that this book had multiple POVs. the ending absolutely wrenched my heart from my chest and i’m excited for a sequel. i’m hoping we get to see more glimpses into the MC’s relationship with her sister in the next one, since we didn’t get to see much of this in the beginning of this book, but overall this was a great read.

dnf @ 30% in. I think this was a me problem more than the book. It's marketed as an "adult epic fantasy," but the writing reads very YA to me. I was expecting something with more "serious" tone and world-building, but this felt very joke-y and unserious. There are pop culture references, modern slang/swearing, boob jokes, and more. It had a brand of humour that didn't quite land for me, and came off a but more cringey than clever. The FMC says "I am burdened with glorious prophecy! Also a glorious bosom, but that's not relevant" and "Sorry, but the old Rahela can't come to the phone right now," which gives you a pretty good indication of the book's tone.

I found the characters to be OK, but even after 30% of the book I found myself struggling to connect with Rae at all. I think this is one of those books you have to just enjoy the ride, but I was not enjoying the ride. It's definitely a case of mismatched expectations based on the blurb! Some people will enjoy this, but unfortunately I was not one of them.

After reading the book for couple days, I spent 5 straight hours finishing the last half of the book.
I have to mention, it takes a while to get into the story. The books demands a suspension of disbelief to work but it also works against itself to keep reminding you this is a book. So the first third or so of the book was a bit hard to get into. But once the story settles in and the characters become more "real" it becomes a thrill to read.
I really enjoyed Rea's character. She is making the best of her assigned villain role and she enjoys it as she should. But by far my favorite parts of the book was the pairing of Cobra and Marius. They were the personification of an introvert being adopted by an extravert. Everytime they share a scene was the parts I was most invested in.
The book does a great job of creating dynamics between characters and having fun with the meta narrative. I found the term "villain" was used a bit too liberally throughout the book but I'm willing to let it go on the grounds of how campy this book is. And, oh boy, is it campy. I enjoyed most of it but I think the random musical number took me out of it a bit too much. Other than that, I loved how it leaned into all the tropes of the genre by being fully self aware.
On a technical level, I found the writing a bit hard to follow at times. There were many occassion where an object/event/person is acknowledged by the characters but it takes about two paragraphs for the reader to see what it is. Those two paragraphs are usually used to describe the reactions by the characters to the acknowledged object/event/person and it makes me think I missed a line while reading the book. Normally I wouldn't mention it but it happened too many times for me to ignore after a while. Another thing to mention, due to the meta aspect of the book, there are times where the situations were overanalyzed by the characters and they take away the reader's chance to analyze the situation themselves. This kinda works against the "show not tell" aspect of storytelling (I know that is for visual media but it does apply here I think). I didn't mind these analyses, they were very solid but they also made me feel like I was being fed information instead of being able to come to conclusions myself.
Overall, it was a joy of a book to read and I am looking forward to the sequel.

I was provided a digital ARC of this book by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I was interested in this book from the start as a fan of Sarah Rees Brennan's previous novel In Other Lands— which is an all time favorite of mine— and many many of the things I adore about that book are present in Long Live Evil! The humor, the character dynamics, and the genre and trope critiques all make for a book with high tension, high stakes, good laughs, and characters that I grew to love. This book is interested in keeping you glued to your seat with action while dissecting the morally gray love interest, the temptress, the heroine, and the henchman and it does all that without feeling stuffy, or like it's shoving a message down your throat.

I do think that this book takes a quite a few chapters to hit it's stride. The main character, Rae, enters the fantasy world abruptly and in a way that messed with my suspension of disbelief. There are also some cringe lines of slang dialogue and truly cliche and unconvincing speeches about the nature of good and evil in those first few chapters. That said, if you can buy in and stick out the story for a while, the characters become progressively more real and their interactions more interesting and poignant. By the time I was on the last half of this book I was staying up reading until 3am and then waking up the next morning immediately eager to read the rest.

I'm personally very excited to see where this series goes in the next book!

I had the BEST time reading this. Sarah Rees Brennan writes books that you know she had the best time writing, and this was no exception. Not only was this absolutely fantastic, but it was also incredibly funny. Truly cannot wait for the next Time of Iron book.

I will remain as neutral as possible for this review, but I will preface that I was intrigued by the summary and the book cover, but ultimately this book just wasn’t for me (and more likely isn’t really for anyone over the age of 20). However, I will not demerit the book simply because it doesn’t meet my preferences.

From the summary I was expecting a fun campy dark comedy novel that fully embraces the villain’s side. It got me excited because in my mind I was imagining the Evil Queen in Once Upon a Time or Emma Stone’s version of Cruella. However, I got a new adult book that leans more into young adult and relies heavily on modern references, slang, and dialogue and becomes a very serious and dark book in the final act of the novel. While it is campy in the beginning, it is almost too campy and borderline annoying. Again, this book will appeal to people of a younger audience who want to see themselves thrown into a fantasy setting. It just isn’t for me or my demographic.

The writing style is wholly unique and will appeal to fans of Brennan’s previous work. But for those like me who use this as their first foray into her style, it will take some getting used to. There are also a ton of characters with chapters from multiple POVs and a lot of characters also have nicknames. I was literally making margin notes just to keep track of who was who. While the premise isn’t unique, the plot pacing and story execution could use some cleaning up, something I expect will impact the sequel. If you need something different to try, give it a shot!

This was an overall enjoyable read but I can't help but compare this isekai novel with the plethora of works in Chinese and Japanese and it just wasn't quite different enough for me to give a higher rating. However, I do see this having the potential to become a niche enjoyment for many English readers and I hope Sarah will be able to add more to this subgenre in English.

I have FEELINGS about this book.

I love the concept and the characters. The world can be a bit confusing; it would be so cool to include a map, index of characters, etc. from “Time of Iron,” the series within the book. I digress; as I was saying, there are some really cool characters, and I have a particular favorite - a certain sociopathic bodyguard.

The book starts off darkly funny, and by the end it’s distinctly tragic and not funny. There are several shocking twists that caught me by surprise. There are multiple POV characters, which I did not appreciate at first, but by the end, I grew to love them all. There are also more than one slow-burn romance going on, including M/F, F/F, and M/M pairings.

I can’t wait to get my hands on the next book, but I also fear what’s next for these characters. I might have wanted to throw my Kindle at the wall during more than one brutal moment.

This was really good! I wish that there were more books about the villain because there’s not enough. We need more insight into how villains are and just how amazing their stories can be, just like this book. I really liked Rae, I thought she was a really compelling character and the plot was super interesting as well.

Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit Books for providing me with a free eARC in exchange for an honest review.

Honestly, this is probably more of a 3-3.5 but I rounded up because I loved the twist at the end.

The reason I was leaning more towards a 3 star rating is because of the same issues other reviewers have mentioned: the pacing, as well as the overall tone of the book.

The pacing was sort of all over the place, and honestly made me put the book down for longer than I would have when taking a break from reading normally. (It took me over a month to finish this book if that means anything.) Stuff would be really interesting and then just flag out of nowhere and I’d lose interest again. Then I’d force myself to keep reading, it would be very slow and then eventually pick up and be interesting again.

Part of that has to do with the tone of the novel. I know it’s the author’s “thing” to write witty books but I really feel like this book would’ve been a lot better if she’d just made the whole thing a more serious novel. I find that a lot of books use cultural references as Rees Brennan does to be funny (and I admit there were some funny bits) but all it does is tend the date the novel as well as slow it down—because every time Rae/Rahela makes a reference or comment the other characters don’t understand, there’s always a moment where they have to stop and comment on it or question it. And it happens in this book All. The. Time. When your comedy slows the narrative, maybe it’s time to move on and stop being funny? (And like I said, there were some good bits in all of that (the Cobra naming his horse Google Maps because he can find his way anywhere lol) BUT I don’t think it worked all the time in this book.

Also! When Rees Brennan writes serious conversations and action scenes? They’re really good!! I loved those parts. A book can be serious without being doom and gloom all the time, and I think the author could do that if she wanted.

And, as mentioned above, I loved the twist at the end. I knew that character would come back once all the ghouls started climbing out of the abyss, so I probably should’ve expected it, but I didn’t and I loved it. Full disclosure: if it hadn’t been for that twist, I don’t know that I’d be as interested in reading the sequel.

And speaking of certain characters, I’m not sure how we the readers are meant to think of Key. Like, was he really in love with Rae or was he actually just unhinged/borderline scarily obsessed with her. As much as I liked the ending, I had a hard time pinning his character down, especially because Rae herself doesn’t seem to understand him. (On the other hand, that might’ve been on purpose because not knowing definitely plays into the ending and keeps you guessing about his future motivations. I guess I would’ve liked a more concrete answer as to his feelings beforehand, though either way, “real love” or “insanity” still make him a scarier figure now.)

But yeah, I’m interested in the sequel. I’m really curious, too, as to whether Rae does end up back in her real life or if we just never see the real world again. I feel like she should at least get a goodbye scene with her sister if that’s the case.

First I want to give a big thank you to Orbit and NetGalley for the digital ARC! All thoughts and opinions are my own.

The best way I can summarize my reading experience of Long Live Evil, is a never ending dumpster fire that you cant stop watching. So that might sound a little harsh but I had such high hopes for this book especially since it’s rumored that Fairyloot is doing a special edition of this book.

Now just because this book wasn’t for me. I still want to mention there were a few positives to this book. The beginning I actually throughly enjoyed. Hooked me immediately from the start. I mean who wouldn’t want to read about a main character dying from cancer who gets a chance to enter her sister’s favorite book by a mysterious crone figure for a chance to save her fate. Loved it thought it was an amazing concept and started off strong.

Then we get further into the story and come across these writing examples, “Seriously, you will be powerful A.F.” And that’s where you lose me. There are other examples throughout the book that are just as cringe worthy as that. The use of modern slang in this fantasy world was just too much and it felt forced. Due to this I needed to close my kindle and take a breather, cause my eyes were bleeding.

The middle of the book was extremely boring with way too much info dumping. I honestly debated about DNFing multiple times but solely pushed through because of my love for Key. The court intrigue was fine but nothing that hasn’t been done before. The other character POV were also extremely boring and at some points confusing. I really wish Sarah would’ve only stuck to Rae’s POV. And lastly the ending was predictable.

Overall this book was not for me. I honestly don’t think in good conscience I can recommend it. Which sounds horrible because I do love Sarah Rees Brennan's YA offerings. Thank you again Netgalley and Orbit for providing digital advanced copy in exchange for honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit for this ARC of Long Live Evil by Sarah Rees Brennan! This was a really fun book to read. I think the premise had me incredibly interested and overall I thought this book delivered what I was looking for. I always find Sarah Rees Brennan's writing style to be entertaining, and fortunately Long Live Evil was no exception. If you've ever read a book by her before you already know the writing style for this one. It's very distinctive. I've truly never read an author with a more unique voice, and I find that her books are always immediately recognizable as hers. The characters and the dialogue all always have this quality to them that I can't really describe, but I definitely know it when I read it! So if you have enjoyed her work in the past, I think you'll have a great time with this book. The humor worked for me, but it might not be for everyone. Some things were a little cringey, but I think in a lot of ways that was part of the charm. That will be a matter of opinion and you'll have to see for yourself what you think.

I felt like Long Live Evil was very character driven, which is an interesting choice for an epic fantasy story, but I definitely approved. This is only the first book in a series so there may be more world-building to come. But honestly I liked what we got. The world itself wasn't as important to this story as the characters and their goals and dynamics with each other were. And seeing as I felt that was the main focus, I was glad to see how well done the characters were. This book switches between several POVs and I loved each one of them. There is really no character I didn't enjoy. Key and Marius were both favorite characters of mine.

I will say that it was a little light on the romance, but I see that changing as the series goes on. Certainly some romances were set up so I guess we'll have to stay tuned.

As you can tell from the summary of the book, Rae goes from our contemporary world to the fantasy world of her favorite books, and she inhabits the body of the story's villainess. Her background does make some of the dialogue more modern than you'd expect for a fantasy. If you've read In Other Lands, it's similar with the 'a modern person brings aspects of modernity to fantasy world' concept, and the effect on things like the dialogue is comparable.

Anyway, Rae embraces her opportunity for villainy, but in more of a fun way than I expected. She and her "minions" (especially my favorite minion) have their evil plans and do evil deeds, but this book is a little unserious with it. Until the last thirty percent where everything is very serious and I could not put the book down. I think that last thirty percent is what bumped this book up from a four to a five for me. I was just floored at several moments. There are some delicious twists that I really didn't see coming (some I did but they still delivered) and they were well worth a slightly slow beginning and a fun & sometimes silly middle. It all built up well to a great climax! This was where the fantasy finally felt epic for me!

And what a way to end the book! Sarah Rees Brennan has never hid the fact that she enjoys being cruel to her readers, so I don't know why I expected anything else. But wow I can't believe I have to wait for the next book after that cliffhanger. So fair warning about that.

I think this book is definitely for fans of Sarah Rees Brennan. If you've never read her work, this adult fantasy debut by her is a good place to start. Definitely recommend it to readers who enjoy fantasy as a genre and like books that can go from goofy fun to what oh no pain. It plays around with tropes of villains and heroes in a way that really worked for me, and I think others will agree! I also think the main selling point of Long Live Evil is it's cast of characters, about whom I cannot wait to read more! Book two cannot come soon enough!

I loved this book! The only thing that bothered me was all the nicknames. It was a little confusing and it took me 3/4 of the book to be able to remember who was who. And how dare it end like that. I need book 2 right now.

Thank you NetGalley & Orbit for this ARC. While I enjoyed the book and the interesting story- I felt the beginning was a bit slow and the ending left me baffled. I really didn’t start devouring the book till 70% through. I had my suspicions about the ending about half way through and I was absolutely correct, but that ending was just so abrupt. There was still so much left to say in my option. Will this be a duology? I was waiting for some type of epilogue that’s how abrupt it ended. So, I was left wanting more. That being said, I still enjoyed the book and story. I loved the band of vipers, and you just can’t help rooting for the villains. I’ll definitely pick up the next one in the series just so I can see what happens next.

DNF @11%

I unfortunately just could not get into this one. The writing was clunky and poorly paced, the plot didn’t really make sense, and I wasn’t a fan of any of the characters. Right off the bat Rae is a hard character to root for. She constantly calls her sister ugly (I have a sister- I get joking around but that was literally the only character trait we’re given). Once we get to the fantasy world Rae’s actions make even less sense. She becomes so annoying and is constantly saying things that show she does not belong in this world. Like, shouldn’t she be trying to blend in?

It’s an interesting premise but unfortunately the execution just left me wanting more.
Thank you to NetGalley and Orbit for the ARC!