To start with, SRB has a very distinctive voice and sense of humor - if you don't like, it you're not going to like this book. I loved her other works, especially In Other Lands, and generally find her very funny. That said, in LLE humor was just a bit too much and went from mildly over the top to grating. In Other Lands got away with heavy usage of slang and modern references because everyone knew Elliot was from another world, but in LLE it just came off as jarring.

To get a sense of whether this might be too much for you, this is the scene where I almost DNF'ed: Rae, who comes from the modern world and enters this book world, has a ballroom scene where she dances around the room while singing one of the villain songs from the musical based on the book in her world (lyrics included), and the rest of the ballroom attendees sing out the "Evil!" chorus (despite this not being a known musical in the book world).

Humor aside, I found the middle 50% of LLE a narrative mess - the plot was all over the place, and the characters either have the same modern voice or are generic 2D fantasy characters (which, I get might be the point but isn't well executed if it is). However, I actually really enjoyed the last 25%, when the plot started coming together and the characters became more endearing, and the ending made me want to read the sequel.

My other quibble - I do feel a bit cheated of getting an actual story from a villain pov. Rae is very much not a villain or even a morally grey anti-hero; she's a scared young woman who thinks she has to play the villain role, but she actually....doesn't? For a book whose premise is celebrating villains, it just doesn't deliver on that front.

I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed this book! Its quirky and enchanting story completely exceeded my expectations, leaving me absolutely hooked by the end. Rae, the main character, was such a blast to follow—her character was just so intriguing and entertaining! I particularly appreciated the author's approach of giving us insight into everyone's point of view/life, adding a nice touch to the narrative. The Cobra and Key were hands down my favorite side characters throughout!

Overall, it was a super fun read, and I definitely recommend diving into its unique story!

Thank you for the opportunity to read this ARC!

“An anti-hero was just a villain with good PR.”

The best way to go into this book is expecting it to be totally campy and slightly unserious. That way the emotional uppercut you take while reading it hurts even more.

No but seriously, there was so much about this book that just worked. It could have been, perhaps even should have been, a tropey mess. But the whole point of the book was about the subversion of tropes and the questioning of how good and evil is traditionally treated within the narrative. I absolutely adore a meta text, so I knew the ‘story within a story’ premise would work for me. As for some of the archetypes, I was prepared to be bored, even annoyed with them. I am so glad to be proven wrong. Yes, the story is about a villain doing villain things. But it’s so much more than that. I think it’s better to go into the story a bit blind in this case, so that’s all I’ll say on that.

Overall, this is a very character driven story. Which works out beautifully because this cast of characters are chaotic in all the best ways. Even the side characters feel fully fleshed out, with very compelling driving factors behind their actions. Rae was the perfect conductor of mayhem. The right mixture of bitchy and vulnerable, Rae constantly surprised me. Plus her running commentary on fairy tales made her the snarky FMC of my dreams. There were a few other semi-main characters that I completely fell for: The Golden Cobra and Key. I love The Golden Cobra’s story, specifically how it relates to another character. I am so glad this book is going to be a series, as I can’t wait to see what else SRB has in store for them. As for Key… let’s just say he has my whole heart and didn’t mind ripping it out.

I’ll be honest, I was hoping to enjoy this book, but I wasn’t expecting to fall in love with it the way I did. This will definitely be one of my top reads, and will probably haunt me for months. Yay!

Update 2:
Thank you SO much to Netgalley and Orbit for providing me with this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Update 1:
Everything about this book screams that it will be one of my favorite books of this summer. The title, the cover, the description are just IT.

I really tried to read this one but unfortunately DNF it at 12%.

What I liked about the book:
* The relationship between the sisters
* The MCs spunk

What I didn't like about the book:
* The writing just wasn't for me. Sentences like "Holy s***, Jesus, Batman, don't kill me!" just don't work for me.
* I didn't like the way the MCs interacted with each other. The dynamics just felt silly (though I get that's what the book is supposed to be.)

This might be a fun read for some people. Unfortunately, it just wasn't for me.

Thank you to Orbit and the author for this e-arc in exchange for my honest review.

This makes me so sad because this has so much potential. However, with bad writing, inexcusable switch-ups, and awful characters this made for a slog of a book. I literally couldn't progress in this because every couple seconds there was a glaring mistake. No matter what, that sucked the enjoyment out of this read.

Let's go through the hate list. (I'm sorry if I'm especially hate-y here, the hater in me is really unlocked now).

The Writing

The writing here was TRULY elementary. It tried way to hard for literally nothing. Instead of being somewhat tolerable flowery writing, it was horrible writing that reminded me of a 13-year-old's creative writing assignment. Here are some of my favorite examples:

"Alice's rosebud mouth"
"Being nice was nice, being nasty got shit done."
"The books were grim and also dark. The series title might as well be Holy Shit, Basically Everyone Dies."
"The Emperor loved like an apocalypse."
"It just makes me feel understood when nobody in my life understands me" (talking about a fantasy series with a psychopathic murderer as the main character)
"By the time I'm done with it, the story will beg me for mercy."
"...and cheekbones so angled they were like hexagons."
"'I'm a treacherous, power-hungry bitch, and honestly? It feels amazing.'"
"'Everything they say about Lady Rahela's enormous... tracts of land is true."

THE Inexcusable Switch Up

I can excuse a lot of things in writing. I can brush stuff off as silly little mistakes, especially when I get an ARC. What I cannot excuse is the author giving us a huge lesson in court hierarchy and then messing it up right after that.

For those who don't know, noble ladies and ladies-in-waiting are ENTIRELY different people.

Noble ladies are aristocrats. They have a high status in court, and in some places they are one of the highest status, right below the king/queen. They're usually from a long line of people who have been nobles forever, and experience special privileges.

Ladies-in-waiting are the noble ladies' personal attendants. They are usually very personally connected to the noble ladies they attend to, and are sometimes raised with them since birth or since both people were very young. They get a higher status than normal servants, are often dressed in nicer clothes, and get special privileges as well.

Ladies-in-waiting are different than maids as well, as maids often did menial, housekeeping tasks. They were not dressed as nicely, and did not form extremely personal connections with the nobles they served.

HOWEVER, despite the CLEAR differences between these 3 categories, right after we got the whole lecture on court hierarchy, we got this:

"Her guard must've bolted from his alcove when he saw her at the window. Every lady-in-waiting had a bodyguard and a maidservant."

What the hell. What. The. Hell. That is INSULTING. You give us a whole lecture on court hierarchy, and then do THIS? Later, the author even calls the lady-in-waiting a maid. She isn't a maid, she is a prime example of a lady-in-waiting, but you STILL use the wrong terms. I couldn't read any farther after that. It made me so mad.

The Characters
Rae was INSUFFERABLE. She claimed she was a "reader" and that books were her entire life, but she's only read 2 books and didn't even read the first book in the series. She then proceeds to act like an entitled brat. She tries to be a baddie, but it flops so hard she seems like a gacha club "baddie".

I'm sorry, but I literally couldn't finish this. It was awful, a slog, and just... unoriginal to be frank. Read the isekais that did it better.

bottom line: i'm disappointed and my day is ruined
————————————
interested to see how well received this is bc this sounds like a lot of isekai plotlines

got the arc!!! now I’m even more interested in how the plot is structured because again this sounds like a lot of isekai

- thank you publisher for the arc -

Long Live Evil is about a girl who gets to live in her favorite book. Gets to live with her favorite characters & help direct it to where it’s meant to go. There is evil characters, magic, politics, and subplot romance. All things I really like & would make you think this book would be a joy for me. Unfortunately this book just missed the mark so hard for me.

Number one issue is how I didn’t care about any of the characters. There was really no incentive to root for them. I was being told the story through 4 characters but at the end of the book I couldn’t really tell you much about them. They were all flat & no real character development. Also the fact that when the main character was in the fantasy world, she end up being not in her own body, which wasn’t my cup of tea. I can forgive a lot in a book as long as I like the characters, so that’s where everything went wrong for me.

The pacing in this book is all over the place. We start off with being in the modern world & then within the first 5% are thrusted into the fantasy world with no real build up. With this choice not to have more build up, the book felt very clunky. I felt immensely bored, confused, & not invested in the storyline. It’s a great idea for a storyline, but the way it was executed took all the magic away.

Now I won’t say this is a fault of the book, more a fault in what I like, but the use of modern lingo was cringy. It felt forced into the storyline & messy. Again, I think that’s a me thing not something that should totally be held against the book.

The one thing I did end up liking when I read this book was the character Key. His character was the only one I wanted to see & know more about. With that, I will read the next book in this series just to see what happens to him.

With that being all said, this book is a 2.5⭐️ read for me. Considering how I can see other people really enjoying this, I’ve decided to round it up to a 3⭐️.

Thank you to NetGalley & Orbit for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was just not for me. I tried to get into this 3 separate times, thinking that maybe I wasn't in the right mood or something. But really, it just never hit. Chapter 1 was so rough and had me battling with myself on whether I should DNF. Unfortunately, it didn't get better for me and I ended up DNFing at 45%.

The premise of the book is incredibly interesting, and what originally had me so excited to start this book. However, I found the book to be very info-dumpy in places, there were so many times where things were rehashed (or the reader was hand-held) that I got annoyed, and so many cringey moments that I eventually had to stop reading. Also, the modern "trying-to-be-hip" slang mixed into a fantasy world had me rolling my eyes. Overall, it was a miss for me.

Thank you Netgalley and Orbit for the advanced copy.

Deciding to DNF a review book is never an easy choice for me, since I always feel an obligation to fully read the ARCs that publishers make available to the blogging community, but in this case the struggle to keep going proved to be too hard: Long Live Evil is not a bad book in itself, but it turned out to be the wrong fit for my tastes, and to be something different from its premise and promise.

Rae is a young woman dying of cancer: while she lays in her hospital bed, her younger sister Alice keeps her company by reading aloud from her favorite fantasy series, Time of Iron, a saga over which the two of them bonded despite the differences in age and reading tastes: where Alice prefers the positive characters, Rae always had a penchant for the series’ villains and the sisters often debate the various merits of the two sides of the story. One night, a strange woman materializes at Rae’s bedside with a strange proposal: to cross over to the fictional realm of Time of Iron and collect a special flower that will cure her. Once she crosses into the fictional world, Rae discovers she’s impersonating Rahela, the arch-villainess of the saga, and she proceeds to collect allies and minions to avoid her impending execution and to fulfill the task that will ensure her survival.

As a premise this sounded very intriguing, with the promise of poking some fun both at the general themes of fantasy literature and at the tropes typical of YA sagas burdened by purple prose. Unfortunately the execution, at least from my point of view, fell quite short of its mark: for starters, there is a huge amount of info-dumping due to the necessity of acquainting the readers with the overall story of Time of Iron, and with the individual stories of the various characters - this of course considerably slows down the narrative, and since it happens very often, it soon breeds annoyance and impatience for the plot to move forward. Which does not happen, at least as far as I managed to read…

Also, it does not help that what promised to be a tongue-in-cheek humorous delivery does not feel like it: in my opinion the book tries far too hard, and in so doing defeats its own purpose. An example? Every single character, besides their own name, sports a moniker - and for the most part they sound either goofy or absurd - so that the plethora of characters is further saddled by these nicknames that always, always accompany their mention. After a while what little amusement I could derive from that swiftly evaporated.

As I stated, this is clearly not the right kind of story for me, and despite my negative outlook I’m comforted by the fact that the overall reception for this book is positive, so that I feel a little less guilty in expressing my unpopular opinion….

Thank you NetGalley and Orbit books for an ARC! (GR and SG reviews to be posted next month, closer to the release date).

The profound disappointment I had with this book is really hard to articulate. It is a shallow addition to the "isekai'd into a book" genre that was made popular by Korean webnovels/manwhas. It's advertised as an adult novel but it's very YA coded, from the humor level, the choice in dialogue, to the character motivations. I suppose it could be adult, but very cringe adult - it goes too far to be camp. Anyway I guess the easier way for me to get thoughts out would be to make a list instead of rant.

Pros:
- The last 3 or so chapters. It actually became serious! No one mentioned how big Rae's tits are (a miracle!).
- Marius and The Cobra. Actually I think the entire novel should have been about them considering they were the most rounded, provoking, and sympathetic characters in the entire book.
- I did like Rae's real life background (before coming to book world), her motivations, illness, and sisterly love and frustrations were tragic, gorgeous, and you can tell it was extremely personal to the author. I wish it had actually translated into Rahela post-transmigration beyond a few moments of "I know what pain is" and "everyone betrays you when you're about to die" thoughts.

Cons:
-The humor is more on the younger side; things like 'poor little meow-meow' (probably the worst offender), naming a snake Victoria Broccoli (ALSO NOBODY CARES THAT THE SNAKE DIED? rude.), a lot of modern slang thrown around that no one for the life of anything ever bats an eye at despite having no idea what the fuck it means.
- Also in the humor category but deserves its own bullet point: the constant talk about Rahela's boobs and how HUGE they apparently are, and how CURVY she is and how much all that must WEIGH. In fact the beginning chapters insinuate that curvy = fat in prettier words. I was so tired of reading about Rae's boobs (she NAMES THEM), that not only was it not funny after - ok it was never funny - but when it started in on the idea that women built voluptuously were always seen in a specific, adulterous light, I no longer could bring myself to care because Rae spent 4 chapters falling over from "being top heavy". Gross.
- None of the MCs are actually villains; or evil. Surprise! More like social outcasts, but rich ones so they can't be tossed to the curb of court, you know! Of course it does that flip floppy thing where the evil one is actually the "hero" of the story - there's also a sociopath, but that's like saying sociopathy is innately evil, so nah to that. But Rae walking in and saying "let's be evil" then commences to do.... extremely non-evil things, is lowkey laughable.
- The ballroom scene where they break out into a musical as a "distraction". I did not know I could possess so much secondhand embarrassment in my body until that moment. Imagine: two people singing acapella, in a huge ballroom full of people who begin chanting (how can you even hear them by this point?), a lady who 20 pages ago kept tipping over because her tits were "too heavy" is suddenly doing hand springs and landing on people's shoulders? I just - I cannot suspend my disbelief that far. In fact that scene broke my disbelief so wide open that I had to beg my friends and family to convince me to not DNF and see it through to the end like a good little soldier.

Anyway, I would like an explanation as to why Rahela gets stabbed in the face in the middle of the book where she saves Lia and herself from assassins, and it says (twice) her face is torn open and bleeding and so forth, but there is no mention of it again afterwards - not even a scar! Wow!

In the end I'll give it 2 stars because when it was finally serious in the last few chapters it was good.

4 stars.

This was a fun ride of a book! I, as will probably be the case for many readers of this book, love a good villain character, and I thought this book had some pointed things to say about who is the villain in a narrative and who gets to be the hero, and why. I really liked the characters, even the minor ones, and I think SRB's strength is in writing unlikable characters who you end up really liking. (Key! My love!)

As for flaws: the pacing felt a little uneven at points, and some characters' parts flowed better than others. I personally was very frustrated with Rae at times, when she was being particularly stubborn about the people around her being real, but it did provide a great opportunity for her character growth.

Some other reviewers have pointed out that the "twist" was obvious, but I don't think it can really be called a twist when it is so heavily foreshadowed - the author scattered a lot of clues to the ending throughout the book. That said, I cannot WAIT to see where SRB goes with these characters next.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced copy.

There is nothing like this book, and I am OBSESSED with it. Long Live Evil is a lush indulgence for anyone who prefers the villains in stories.

This book had me giggling, laughing, kicking my feet, swooning, and crying...over and over again. The villains' backstories were heartbreaking and made me love them all the more. I can't say enough good things about this book and the characters.

To those who have doubts because it's an isekai or you think there's not romance, give it a try and read it anyway. This book was obviously meant to be fun, and I had the most fun reading it. There is romance; it's just not conventional romance!

I am making known now that Key is MINE.

On a serious note, Rae's POV touches on her experience with cancer and chemo, as did the author in the Acknowledgments. I lost my mother to cancer, and I was there with her through all of the chemo and appointments. I appreciated that element in the book because it gave me an idea of what she may have been going through personally. It made me feel closer to my mom. She would have loved Rae.

I am so excited to see what comes next for my favorite villains. I need book two by yesterday, please. Because THAT ENDING!!!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

I feel like if you love isekai in anime, manga or Manhwa then you'll enjoy this book.
We have our main character who is sick with cancer and is offered the chance to escape to her favorite book world by a mysterious stranger....Obviously stuff goes down.
Full of twists and turns, rage, some stabbing and killing...this book was quite enjoyable.
Looking forward to more.

Thank you to Orbit Books and @NetGalley for providing me the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
I was very excited to recieve this book as an ARC; interesting plot and a gorgeous cover. I found it to be okay, maybe not my cup of tea. I couldn't connect to any of the characters. I could not keep the characters straight in my head (sometimes they referred to by different names) and the plot was not as fluid as I would have liked.
I can see many readers enjoying this book, it just was not for me.
#LongLiveEvil #NetGalley

Review 6/10✨ I wanted to love this book so bad but I just didn’t vibe with the plot and characters. This author wrote some of my favorite books so despite the story centering a trope I’m not fond of (person being transported into a fictional story) I was excited to give it a go.

Let’s start with what I liked:

💜There were some great quotes right off the bat about the love of story and books. I was highlighting so many little bits! The author clearly cares about her craft and what it means to be a book lover.

💜The humor has always been a favorite of mine with this author and this book did not disappoint. It was filled with witty and humorous characters.

Alright now for what I didn’t love:

🖤The biggest thing for me was the general tone was a bit all over the place. It started off with some more serious tones, then snapped to like dark comedy? There was a lot of “everyone is a villain” but it was more campy than serious villain. Which would be fine, but it felt not fully committed to that either. Like it didn’t know if it wanted to be dark and adult or not. It is marketed as adult and some things did make it that, but it still read young for what it was trying to do.

🖤The romance was a let down for me. I loooove the romance in the authors other works. This one not so much. It took a really long time to get started and when it did I just didn’t feel the sparks.

🖤Overall it just generally read a bit slow paced, I couldn’t get into the modern human in a fantasy world vibe, and I didn’t connect with the characters. But there were parts that I enjoyed and I think there are definitely people out there that will love this and its uniqueness. It just wasn’t a good fit for me personally. It comes out July 30th!

I went into this not knowing anything about it. It’s definitely a unique read for me. The story revolves around two sisters who bond over their shared love for a book series, which was one of the most relatable aspects for me. From the onset, we learn that our main character, Rae, is dying of cancer. She's approached by a strange individual who offers her a chance to visit a fictional world from the book series she’s read. Now, her only chance at life hinges on finding a flower in this fictional world, or she risks never waking back up in her own body in the real world.

The premise was fascinating and reminds me of the transmigrated manhwa that I love. The story unfolds through multiple POVs, including our main protagonist Rae. I really loved Rae’s character throughout the book; her attitude and behaviors were very relatable, especially her bluntness and straightforwardness regarding her situation. She's the kind of character I most love reading about, one who tells it as it is and doesn’t sugarcoat anything.
While there wasn’t much romance involved, I did not mind it. I loved the inclusion of a sapphic relationship; it was charming and adorable. One of my favorite aspects of this book was the use of contemporary slang and terms from the real world in a fantasy setting. This was the one time I was not bothered by this, as the setting reminded me a lot of my favorite transmigrated manhwas where the main character travels back into the body of the villain of a novel and tries her hardest to change her fate.

I am pleasantly surprised that I loved this more at the end than I originally thought I would at the start. It’s a slow start, but hang in there. Give it a chance!

Thank you, NetGalley and Orbit Books, for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I loved Sarah Rees Brennan's novel In Other Lands and was so excited to get to read this one early. I am very much a mood reader, and this might just not be the right time for me to read this. I read 45% and had to conclude it wasn't working for me, even as I admire what the author is doing. I hope to finish this at a later time, and when I do I'll update my review.

This is a gloriously weird and campy book that I think is going to work wonderfully for some readers and not at all for others. There's a ton going on here - a very funny satire of grimdark fantasy, a portal fantasy, and a heartfelt storyline about the traumatic experience of being a young woman with a terminal cancer diagnosis. There was some great stuff here, but also just a lot happening, and I personally struggled with some of the stylistic choices. That said, I admire the boldness of the author's vision - she's swinging for the fences and I think she's written a really interesting book, even if it's not all landing for me yet. I think part of my experience is due to my current mood and I'm looking forward to giving this book another shot when I'm in a different headspace.

Huge thank you to Sarah Rees Brennan, Orbit Books, and NetGalley for generously providing an ARC for review.

Rae is dying but she gets a second chance at life when she enters into a magical bargain that allows her to enter her and her sister's favourite fantasy book series. It sounds easy because she thinks she knows the story and the characters but her presence begins to bring about changes. She wakes up in the villainess body and rallies her fellow villains to.... unionize?

This is for the individuals who ate up Stone's Cruella De Vil or Cersei Lannister. The morally grey villains whose teetering between right and wrong are more fascinating than watching a heroine triumph once again. It's a satirical fairy tale that echoes the humor of Monty Python films. It shows us exactly why some of us are drawn to such characters and how they often represent the loneliness and pain we all experience but are often reluctant to embrace. The pacing is a little odd and it can get a bit repetitive at times, especially when Rae and her fellow villains really stick to their character traits, but the concept, the banter and witty cracks are nothing short of a good time.

The Assistant to the Villain walked so Long Live Evil could run (no seriously read them!).

Thank you to Orbit Books for providing an ARC through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I was very much looking forward to this book. When I initially read the synopsis I know immediately that this was my kind of story. It had all the elements to be so good. However, I couldn't finish it. I've tried a few different times and I've realized that this story is just not for me.

The story was hard to understand and the pacing was confusing. I understand that a modern day character was inserted into a medieval time and so her approach and language to things were appropriate to her and her time, but something just felt off or forced. At times it just felt like I was reading two different stories. Ultimately, the story was hard to understand and I couldn't find.a reason to commit to it.

Thank you NetGalley for the eARC and for the opportunity to read this book.

Thank you netgalley & orbit books for this eARC in exchange for my honest review.

The premise of this book sounded absolutely incredible. But unfortunately I had to DNF. I could not get into it. I'm a fantasy romance girly through and through, but I just feel like the unserious approach of this book isn't it for me. I get what the author was trying to achieve, but I found the writing incredibly hard to get into. I'm not the target audience of this book, I guess. Maybe I'll approach it again at a later time.

Books are such an important form of escapism for people, and this one is a testament to that.

"Art is the dreamed-of escape. Art lets the dead speak and the living laugh. Art takes you away from pain when no medicine can save you. Art is the first and last word. Art is the final consolation."

This book was so much fun to read, but there was also a fair amount of cringey dialogue and inconsistent pacing- not to mention the random musical scene (which was kind of cool to read). The concept of this book is one that I thoroughly enjoy, as isekai webtoons are something I always gravitate towards, and this was no exception. I think anyone would take the opportunity to jump into their favorite book if given the chance, and especially in Rae's case where it means it could save her real life. Reading her go from not caring much and having an outsider's perspective of the characters from the book, to actually caring about them and viewing them as living people was really the only character development in the book. As thorough as the world building was, there's still room to develop and flesh out the characters more in the next book, which I really hope to see. I loved how Rae constantly, and inadvertently, made the characters around her, such as Key, Emer, Cobra, and Lia, come alive and challenge the archetypes that was placed upon them. Once I hit the halfway mark, I had a hard time putting this down. The modern day references had me dying of laughter at points, especially the horse named Google Maps.

Brennan does a wonderful job at challenging the perceptions we have on those who are considered as good, evil, helpless, and powerful. Each character is not fully what they are expected to be, and the lines blur a lot the more we get to know them. I really am looking forward to the development of some of the characters because there's more to them than they appear. Rae constantly challenges the perceptions we might normally see for someone with terminal cancer, and especially after the author's note at the end, it shows the cruel truths someone in her position experiences. Some of the quotes on her treatment prior to going into the book are emotional to read, and it goes to show the strength and resilience of not only Rae, but Brennan as well.

Overlooking the cringey dialogue and inconsistent pacing at times, this book was a delight to read. I'll be looking forward to seeing what Brennan does with the next installment.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for an advanced reader copy in exchange for my honest review.