We Could Be Villains

by Missy Meyer

Alternate cover version.
ASIN: B00PGB64MG
ISBN-13: 9780986239915

Sarah Valentine is so over seeing drama about her city’s superheroes on every newspaper and TV broadcast. Besides, she has her own problems to worry about: her career isn’t going anywhere, she doesn’t have a boyfriend (or any prospects), and most of her weekends are spent escaping into video games that are way more thrilling than anything that will ever happen to her.

And worst of all, her thirtieth birthday is right around the corner.

But everything changes the day she runs into Nate—a chance encounter with a handsome stranger that turns her quiet life upside down and throws her into the middle of a world of heroes, villains, and adventure.

In We Could Be Villains, Sarah learns that there’s a very hazy line between the good guys and the bad guys. With the help of an unexpected journey, a motley team of professionals, and some eye-opening backstory about the heroes she’s grown up watching, Sarah just might find the job, romance, and excitement she’s been waiting for.

Genres: Fiction, Superheroes, Science Fiction, Crime

307 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 9, 2014

About the author

Missy Meyer was born and raised in Seattle, Washington, but moved to Florida in order to work for the world’s largest mouse. (She’s also had an amazing variety of jobs, including singing improv comedian, game show host, bank teller, webmaster, pizza chef, accountant, camp counselor, and casino dealer.) From 2012 to 2015, she drew the web comic Holiday Doodles . Missy is also a prolific font designer and illustrator.

Missy is married to Scott Meyer, the guy behind the web comic Basic Instructions and the author of Off to Be the Wizard and the Magic 2.0 series of books. They currently live near Phoenix, Arizona, with their two cats.

Reviews

[Morgan Trias · Rating 3 out of 5]

I wanted to like this book so much, but was ultimately unable to, for several reasons.

Firstly, it's a transparently saccarine fantasy for the main character. She's automatically trusted by the villain group, and trained with more than slightly unconvincing ease. Why do they trust her so much and so implicitly they want a graphic designer to be their new "head of art" and come on secret missions? Oh because she's having a very flat romance with the incredibly wealthy head of the organisation. It's no shock these people are susceptible to moles infiltrating their organisation.

The villains are cartoonishly good, and the heroes cartoonishly evil. Seriously, there's a point at which the main guy from the heroes group talks about killing the main character because she's "a useless civilian" for no reason at all apart from creating an unconvincing veneer of evilness. She goes on and on about how cheap their linens are to show they're evil, unlike the villains, who are so good they have very expensive sheets. Oh and they hack a computer system to issue a guy with a refund on his electricity (because they lied to cover something and sid they would, which is fair enough and makes me happy) but they also cut his ongoing electricity rate. Why? Uhhhh cos they're just such nice people. So they're gonna do this. For one random guy.

There's a lot of good ideas but also a lot of deus ex machina. It's patently childish and feels like a first draft. The attempts at "snappy dialogue" feel like they could work (but merit eye rolls) in a TV show but just aren't good enough for a book.

However despite being pretty shallow, it is an enjoyable read if you just want to be soothed and not remotely challenged. I might read the sequel some time I want basically a not-like-other-girls-esque chick flick as a book. But only because I have a kindle unlimited subscription.

I would probably give it 3 stars were it not the abysmal quality of the science. No, you can't get limitless free energy by refracting lasers through a diamond, and if it you could, created diamonds exist. The cost of the operation to steal a diamond (from the evil evil heroes, of course!) would probably cover making an equivalent one in a lab.

[Mathew Walls · Rating 1 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this book, but it's just bad. Slow and dull and, in the end, just a weirdly specific wish-fulfilment fantasy. The antagonists are arseholes specifically to justify the protagonist in doing whatever she wants, and the good guys just love her and give her everything she wants for no real reason.

The idea of corrupt or incompetent super heroes and a super villain whose goal is to expose them is great. That premise is why I wanted to like this book. But here, when the supervillain asks why the heroes are considered good guys and he's considered a bad guy, the answer is obvious: it's because you're committing crimes and they're trying to stop you, dude. And yes, the main super hero is an arsehole. You're still the one doing the crimes. That's why people think you're a criminal - because you are.

But the actual plot is a tiny part of the book. As I said, it's mostly a wish-fulfilment fantasy for the author. The protagonist (an obvious author stand-in) gets recruited by the supervillain Doctor Oracle, whose secret lair is an island where everything is exactly the way she likes it, and everyone likes her and she and her new friends get to go on fun missions to infiltrate fancy parties and steal diamonds. And absolutely none of it is entertaining. Even if you share her specific fantasies, she's still no good at writing about them.

Oh, and her fantasies are incredibly dull. The main one is a food court where you don't have to pay! Seriously. A bar where you get free drinks, but there's a three drinks per day maximum so no one can get drunk (but don't worry, as one of the boss's friends you can get extra booze so you don't need to worry about that limit). A swimming pool next door, but no one's allowed to use it after 11pm so there won't be any annoying neighbours out there at night! No kids allowed! It's all so fucking banal. And that's the majority of the book.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

Picked this up because I love her husband's Wizard books and webcomics, and he posted a recommendation for it. Now that I've read it, I think it's as good or perhaps better than his books - depending heavily on how deeply into geek culture you are. :) While perhaps not an epic for the ages, it's a great quick read, I will definitely be getting the sequels.

Love the premise of being the villains and making the world a better place in secret, while thumbing your nose at the pompous "heroes" that think the world revolves around them. Light-hearted, lampshades some superhero tropes extremely well, and has a believable romantic interest develop without making it a cripplingly-central plot focus.

[Koen Crolla · Rating 2 out of 5]

Clearly a labour of love, but not of great skill. Particularly the first half needs another editing pass for pacing, grammar, and justifying the premise of that part of the plot. It picks up after that, but the dialogue especially never quite approaches believability.
If you have a high tolerance for AO3 writing, though, it'll probably fill a few hours adequately.

[Dmitry · Rating 2 out of 5]

A cozy but not particularly memorable novel. One that you’d read on a beach, without committing much thought to it.

Its main downside, to me, is just how low-stakes it is. There wasn’t a single tense scene I remember, no fascinating compounding of mistakes and mishaps building to a climax. It was more like a problem pinng-pong: a problem is presented, solved straightaway, then the next problem appears and so on. And that was the action parts.

The non-action parts were cool to read about but almost Jule Vernesque in how long they went, lovingly examining the world without moving the plot forward. They were nice enough to read, don’t get me wrong, but I started looking at the percentage read at some point, wondering when the action will begin. (it began at 49%).

And regarding the premise, I thought it was good but very underused. Like, a villain that can metabolize any poison and the heroes who only uses tranquilizer darts, never lethal weapons. Would the villain foil the heroes’ daring heist? How would they match up? The answer is, they just don’t. Yay. Instead, transport balls (golf carts but a bit cooler; zero relevance to the plot, zero explanation of tech that makes them cooler) get more exposition and exploration than most of the protagonists’ foils.

[James Lamb · Rating 2 out of 5]

I wanted to like it (I've purchased a lot of her husband's books), but this is pretty weak. There were some interesting bits, but they weren't held together well. Everything was convenient, there were no stakes. And some stuff was just dumb. For instance, they hack this guy's power bill so it's cheaper each month as an apology for...? Can't recall? Inconveniencing him? Anyhow, yeah, rip off "the man" to show they're good guys. And yet a few pages later a fight in a YMCA trashes the place with no efforts to make things right or undo the damage. I just picture the poor employees showing up on Monday to just see their community's gathering place just utterly ruined and how crestfallen they would be at the wanton destruction. The book's premise was a decent idea that really needed some alpha or beta readers who could have challenged her. I have this idea in my head that she put her husband in an unwinnable position by asking him to give her feedback.

[Chris Brogan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I want a new job

A lot of fun and ingenuity. Definitely a match for her husband's hilarious comic writing style.
Heroes, villains, maybe the other way around. A story that makes you reconsider whether you should judge a person by their label, or think things through for yourself.

[John E · Rating 4 out of 5]

A proper super villain story

This is a priority villains story. The characters are well written and are a wealthy band of robin hood type villains. The super heroes are not the good guys the news wants you to believe. Overall, an easy, well written, likable story.

[Aimee · Rating 5 out of 5]

interesting and gripping and an easy read

[Megan Rizzo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love this book, great world and well developed characters. I will never get tired of reading female characters that make themselves strong.

[Amber Ray · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good premise for the plot, but the quality of writing feels flat.

[Elizabeth Hirschl]

So fun!

This book is a delight to read. I love the take on super heroes and villains. It’s funny and clever.

[Zachary Matheson · Rating 4 out of 5]

A cozy supervillain romance - simple light-hearted fun. Other books might have piled on the tension, but that's not what I was feeling right now, and so this book worked out great.

[Onionboy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book a lot. It was a fun read that I couldn't put down, and was anxious to get back to. I only give 5 stars to the books I enjoy the most and would wholeheartedly recommend, and I have no problem rating this one as a 5.

My only complaint is that the first half dragged quite a bit. She spent a lot of time and detail on how a relationship was going, food, clothes, relaxing at a resort and how it looked. This wasn't bad, but I was anxious for the story to start. Exactly at the half-way mark it picked up the pace and never slowed back down.

As soon as I finished it,I downloaded book #2, so that should show how much I enjoyed this one.

[Caliclia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not your ordinary super hero story that is for sure. The story follows a citizen who is not phased by the Super Heroes in her city. She is a corporate monkey and knows it. This is a character a LOT of us can relate to and because of that we feel as if we can become this character.

I loved and hated this book. I give it a 3 to 4 star rating due to the beginning and end of the book. Once the true story starts to begin the world that is created is obviously a utopian world the author wishes could exist. There is no drama and there is no strife and while the author tries to explain this away by background checks and weeding out those who just do not fit in with the community, it feels forced. The ending feels just as forced. Everything has happened and it seems the author is not quite sure how to wrap things up, so he does a sort of cliff hanger which does not seem to fit with the rest of the story. It would work better as a plug for the next book rather than the last chapter of this book.

While saying all of that, I truly did love the storyline of the middle of the book. Once things start rolling it is easy to get sucked into the story. I really hope the next book leans more this way than the beginning and the end as it was enjoyable and I was left wanting more.

In short, if you are willing to force your way through the first few chapters it is worth it. The story gets going and it is truly a fun and original take on the super hero worlds.

[Adam Koerner · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is just a FUN read. I initially bought this book because I liked her husband Scott Meyer's "Magic 2.0" series, but now I undoubtably believe that this is the superior series.

Let's be straight. This is not the Filet Mignon and Lobster of literature here. Does it have some shortcomings? Sure. The biggest one is that is lacks any real conflict. But in my opinion, that doesn't really keep the book from just being fun.

I also think the book sets up an interesting and all together unexpected universe. Toss out the idea that Superheroes are all good. Accept the fact that they are shallow, narcissistic, and willing to cause major damage to cities and people in their fight against crime, which is honestly something I've thought about before. Think about the potential of the movie Hancock had it not been sidelined by a ridiculous love story.

Be ready to accept some absurdity, suspend your disbelief for a while and enjoy cheap beer and pizza for dinner because at least for me, this book was great.

[Cameron McAvoy · Rating 4 out of 5]

We Could Be Villians started out weak and found its footing as the story progressed. The story doesn't commit any obvious amateur sins, but the early sections do suffer from a lack of editing. I noticed early on, a few sentences and phrases that clearly serve no purpose and are filler. Editing should have caught these and sharpened the prose. However, these minor infractions disappear later in the story, and it is clear by the 10th or 12th chapter or so, the author is more comfortable with the story.

Overall, the plot is fairly straightforward, but that is no sin. Too many authors try to weave complex plots and instead end up with loose ends or holes in the story. This is not the case here. The characters and story are solid overall, but I would have liked to see more backstory to some of the characters introduced in the second-half of the story.

For a first book, not a bad entrance.

[Jennifer Seyfried · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was both fun and smart. I'd give it 3-1/2 stars if I could. I enjoyed it even though the main character was something of a Mary Sue and the plot had some cliched elements to it. I don't want to give anything away, but hey, you don't have to be the world's greatest detective to figure out where and with whom she will wind up with in the end. Yes, it is a geek friendly book because it involves super heroes and villains, but we see it all through the eyes of a woman who is very much a regular person. A smart and talented person, but not super. It was original enough to amuse me in spite of those elements, and to make me get the sequel which I am sure I will read soon.I thought it was a really good first novel.

[David Meiklejohn · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sarah Valentine is stuck in a decent but dull job, in a world where superheroes really exist, but seem a bit off. She gets injured in a hero incident and taken off to an idyllic island lair run by a super villain, who turns out to be more super than villainous. Sarah decides to join the villains and help do good for humanity against the rotten, government run heroes.
The premise is good, the characters are quite likeable, but an awful lot of time was spent commenting on how great everything was at the villains' lair. The big showdown at the end was ok, but I expected a bit more drama.

[Jon Spriggs · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this because I'd read her husband's books and his comics, and when I saw shed had written a book too, I figured I'd give it a go. It's an easy read, and it's an uncomplicated story with very few twists. That's not to say it's not a good book, but the biggest twist was where the super hid the McGuffin.

Much like her husband's books, I'd gladly buy the next one, if only because it's a good book to lose yourself in for a few hours.

[Brittany Marin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Overall it was simple. The characters were fairly flat, lacking a detailed backstory. The most complex character was the antagonist, super-hero Commander Alpha, who was still fairly flat. The villain's hideout was a socialist utopia that was too good to be true and the people were unbelievably nice. The plot was predictable and could use some work. Also, I was a bit disappointed they only alluded to a grander scheme. It was still an enjoyable read.

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

The wife of Scott Meyer (another author I am currently into), has written an absolutely enjoyable book from cover to cover. It's a world where there are superheros and villians - but it's a world that feels very familiar. Loved the characters and cannot wait to read the follow up (which I just discovered today).

[Raven · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun superhero reversal where the heroes are villains and the villians are, if not quite heroic, at least mostly well-intentioned and sympathetically written. Everything is wildly improbable, but what do you expect from a superhero story? Totally bought the sequel, saving it for the next time I want a book which is lighthearted and fun rather than heavy lifting.

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another take on the superhero genre, though this time from the perspective of the villains. A decent read, though I found the end a little jarring, not quite a cliffhanger, more a cliff. Hopefully, there'll be a sequel to finish things off properly.

[Franklin T. Deck · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fun and a joy to read.

Very fun read. The characters are very believable and the story has a great pace that kept my interest. Some great use of references and humor that kept me smiling to the end.

[Lela · Rating 3 out of 5]

I grew up reading Marvel and DC and always thought that the villains were way more interesting so I was really excited to read this novel.
I found it to be a fun enjoyable read; some might find it fluffy but hey it's summer and considering the past few months a little fluff seems perfect to me!

[Robert Notarfrancesco · Rating 5 out of 5]

Highly entertaining

An enjoyable ride of fantasy. I enjoyed tagging along with the"badguys." Great plot and characters. Good pace and a quick read.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

While it should have been a quick read, the story drug on in places. It wasn't a bad story, just didn't hold my interest.

[Carl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pleasantly written, but much more wish-fulfillment romance than supervillainy.

[Josh Hein · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very Nice

Good read! Was done very nicely. Would definitely be interested in additional works! I'm no book critic, just a casual reader but enjoyed it immensely.