If you had to pick the most despicable character you'd ever met while reading a modern novel, who might you finger?

For me, it's a toss up between the arrogant bully Tom Buchanan swaggering through The Great Gatsby and Advokat Nils Erik Bjurman, Lisabeth's slimey guardian in The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. And when I say slimey, I mean just that: slimey. Check out Dragon if you haven't already done so.

The bad guys in print leave me gritting my teeth. I mean don't you just want to step into the scene and smack around the villain just to vent your ire?

Take Tom, for example. He messes around with Myrtle, and it's okay. But when Daisy and Gatsby take a shine to each other, he goes postal on Gatsby.

I almost applaud when the villain gets his (or her) comeuppance. In fact, I wonder if it shouldn't be a rule that fiction authors craft their plots to ensure the antagonist gets his (or her) just desserts.

By Ed Lynskey
@edlynskey
Author of Lake Charles
"Satisfying."
The Rap Sheet/Kirkus Reviews