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Hench #2
Villain
Not yet published
Expected 19 May 26The Boys meets Starter Villain and Assistant to the Villain in Natalie Zina Walschots’s electrifying, sharp, violent, and hilarious sequel to the highly acclaimed novel, Hench, in which the Auditor must confront the near-impossible in order to right the many wrongs in the superhuman industry…or cause more of them. She’s not picky.
Anna, better known to superheroes as the Auditor, has carved out a name for herself. Any hero unlucky enough to cross her path knows her potential and powers. Surely, success should taste she has an incredible job with lots of perks, and her boss will literally annihilate anyone who crosses her, and her greatest enemy, the former hero Supercollider, has been utterly defeated and literally ground to a pulp.
But Anna still has her sights set on a greater destroying the Draft, the organization that makes, trains, and manages the world’s most powerful superheroes. These “heroes” have shown time and time again that they do more harm than good, and now is the time to stop the damage at its source.
Yet all is not well for the Auditor and her fellow evildoers. Her employer, Leviathan—the world’s most feared supervillain—is not coping well with Supercollider’s defeat at someone else’s hands. Moreover, her unlikely ally and unexpected friend, Quantum Entanglement, has vanished without a trace, leaving Anna to examine all the ways they deceived each other. Tension and uncertainty fill the air, and fear that this moment of triumph is about to crumble looms over all of them.
Anna soon finds herself facing down an opponent unlike any she’s taken on before—not another superhero, but someone like her…someone much more the Draft’s Chief Marketing Officer. This isn’t a test of physical prowess, but ideas, and as the fight spirals deeper and deeper, with new foes popping up every day—she’ll need more than just her superpower—data research—to keep ascending through the supervillain ranks.
It’s guerrilla ad warfare, and the Auditor might have finally met her match.
Anna, better known to superheroes as the Auditor, has carved out a name for herself. Any hero unlucky enough to cross her path knows her potential and powers. Surely, success should taste she has an incredible job with lots of perks, and her boss will literally annihilate anyone who crosses her, and her greatest enemy, the former hero Supercollider, has been utterly defeated and literally ground to a pulp.
But Anna still has her sights set on a greater destroying the Draft, the organization that makes, trains, and manages the world’s most powerful superheroes. These “heroes” have shown time and time again that they do more harm than good, and now is the time to stop the damage at its source.
Yet all is not well for the Auditor and her fellow evildoers. Her employer, Leviathan—the world’s most feared supervillain—is not coping well with Supercollider’s defeat at someone else’s hands. Moreover, her unlikely ally and unexpected friend, Quantum Entanglement, has vanished without a trace, leaving Anna to examine all the ways they deceived each other. Tension and uncertainty fill the air, and fear that this moment of triumph is about to crumble looms over all of them.
Anna soon finds herself facing down an opponent unlike any she’s taken on before—not another superhero, but someone like her…someone much more the Draft’s Chief Marketing Officer. This isn’t a test of physical prowess, but ideas, and as the fight spirals deeper and deeper, with new foes popping up every day—she’ll need more than just her superpower—data research—to keep ascending through the supervillain ranks.
It’s guerrilla ad warfare, and the Auditor might have finally met her match.
368 pages, Paperback
Expected publication May 19, 2026
11597 people want to read
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Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this early review copy.
It's been a LONG wait for this novel!! And it is everything you want it to be. This will be one of the best books I read this year.
I have tried for weeks to properly gather my thoughts and give this masterpiece the review it deserves. I have failed. This is the best I can do. In the author's note, Walschots says that writing this book nearly killed her, she re-wrote it four times. Her hard work and dedication (and blood sweat and tears, perhaps) shows. This book is brilliant, a work of genius. I often had to pause and remind myself I was reading a novel , not a documentary.
I was worried that I would have forgotten a lot of important details over the years (yes my memory is a sieve, which is why I always write a review - to help ME remember!), but Walschots managed to include all the information you need, without EVER making it feel like she was just info-dumping. Her writing feels effortless.
Every line of dialogue, every speech, every description - it all flows naturally. Instead of being distracted by the writing, I was THERE, immersed in the story. Every plot development feels organic, every step builds on the previous step.
I took my time reading, savoring every aspect, every plot development, every passage of dialogue. As a result, this took me several weeks to finish, but I'm glad I did not rush. This deserved a slower pace to fully appreciate it, to let my mind dwell on it during the day when I was not reading.
I never quite knew where the story was headed. (Unlike the Auditor, I am not a genius at predicting the future based on past events). I could not imagine how it would end.
The ending is left open-ended, which normally feels unsatisfying, but in this case it felt fitting. The characters will continue their lives, making choices, moving forward . I am glad they continue to live and evolve, in my head. Is it left for the reader to imagine what comes next? Or will Walschots write another sequel? (I am so HERE for it if she does!!)
character list (in case there's another book and I need to remember - its not really a spoiler, just uninteresting):
words I looked up:
narthex - an antechamber, porch, or distinct area at the western entrance of some early Christian churches, separated off by a railing and used by catechumens, penitents, etc.
gelid - icy, extremely cold.
pauldron - a piece of armor covering the shoulder where the body piece and arm piece join.
tasset - a piece of plate armour designed to protect the upper thighs
chelicerae - appendages on the head of spiders and other arachnids: often modified as food-catching claws
contrapposto - Contrapposto is an Italian visual arts term that describes a human figure in a natural pose with most of their weight concentrated on one leg. With both feet on the ground, the body forms an asymmetrical shape—the shoulders and hips tilt in opposite directions, while the torso and pelvis do the same. One leg is teso, or tense, and the other is rilassato, or relaxed
********
I don't even need to know what this book will be about - you're promising me more-book in the Hench world? that's all I need to know. Give it to me.
It's been a LONG wait for this novel!! And it is everything you want it to be. This will be one of the best books I read this year.
I have tried for weeks to properly gather my thoughts and give this masterpiece the review it deserves. I have failed. This is the best I can do. In the author's note, Walschots says that writing this book nearly killed her, she re-wrote it four times. Her hard work and dedication (and blood sweat and tears, perhaps) shows. This book is brilliant, a work of genius. I often had to pause and remind myself I was reading a novel , not a documentary.
I was worried that I would have forgotten a lot of important details over the years (yes my memory is a sieve, which is why I always write a review - to help ME remember!), but Walschots managed to include all the information you need, without EVER making it feel like she was just info-dumping. Her writing feels effortless.
Every line of dialogue, every speech, every description - it all flows naturally. Instead of being distracted by the writing, I was THERE, immersed in the story. Every plot development feels organic, every step builds on the previous step.
I took my time reading, savoring every aspect, every plot development, every passage of dialogue. As a result, this took me several weeks to finish, but I'm glad I did not rush. This deserved a slower pace to fully appreciate it, to let my mind dwell on it during the day when I was not reading.
I never quite knew where the story was headed. (Unlike the Auditor, I am not a genius at predicting the future based on past events). I could not imagine how it would end.
The ending is left open-ended, which normally feels unsatisfying, but in this case it felt fitting. The characters will continue their lives, making choices, moving forward . I am glad they continue to live and evolve, in my head. Is it left for the reader to imagine what comes next? Or will Walschots write another sequel? (I am so HERE for it if she does!!)
character list (in case there's another book and I need to remember - its not really a spoiler, just uninteresting):
words I looked up:
narthex - an antechamber, porch, or distinct area at the western entrance of some early Christian churches, separated off by a railing and used by catechumens, penitents, etc.
gelid - icy, extremely cold.
pauldron - a piece of armor covering the shoulder where the body piece and arm piece join.
tasset - a piece of plate armour designed to protect the upper thighs
chelicerae - appendages on the head of spiders and other arachnids: often modified as food-catching claws
contrapposto - Contrapposto is an Italian visual arts term that describes a human figure in a natural pose with most of their weight concentrated on one leg. With both feet on the ground, the body forms an asymmetrical shape—the shoulders and hips tilt in opposite directions, while the torso and pelvis do the same. One leg is teso, or tense, and the other is rilassato, or relaxed
********
I don't even need to know what this book will be about - you're promising me more-book in the Hench world? that's all I need to know. Give it to me.
Want to Read
May 20, 2024Expected publication October 24, 2023
heavy breathing
Update: Expected publication October 1, 2024
Maaaaaan! I'm willing to wait for quality though
Update 5/20/2024
Noticed Amazon has the title listed as "Villain."
As we all know, the real villain is pivot tables. I assume the Auditor will have many worthy fights ahead of her in this novel.
heavy breathing
Update: Expected publication October 1, 2024
Maaaaaan! I'm willing to wait for quality though
Update 5/20/2024
Noticed Amazon has the title listed as "Villain."
As we all know, the real villain is pivot tables. I assume the Auditor will have many worthy fights ahead of her in this novel.
Want to Read
February 27, 2024GIVE IT TO ME WHY AM I STILL WAITING
Want to Read
January 3, 2023hmmmmmMMMMMM? Hench sequel? I am very intrigued…
November 23, 2025
* thanks to William Morrow for the NetGalley review copy (pub date: May 19, 2026)
I have been stalking NetGalley for this book for YEARS - the pub date changed a bunch of times, but now it’s coming out for real, and it was worth the wait. Longer review TK but goddam I loved this.
I have been stalking NetGalley for this book for YEARS - the pub date changed a bunch of times, but now it’s coming out for real, and it was worth the wait. Longer review TK but goddam I loved this.
April 17, 2026
2.5; in the nicest way possible, this wasn’t good. too many things were left dangling and unaddressed and even though there’s going to be a follow up book, that still didn’t excuse anything. not going to be reading the next one and honestly don’t know how i got through this one.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
I could read 100 more books set in this world. I want all the fascinatingly mundane inner-workings of the superhero/supervillain industries!
Stepping into her role as the Auditor, Anna (and the rest of Leviathan's retinue) are taking on a new foe: not a lone superhero, but the institution that empowers them, known as The Draft. In this complicated chess game of corporations, politics, violence, and (perhaps) love, is Anna a queen or just another pawn?
This series is so joy-inducing that I even had fun writing that blurb. Don't get me wrong, it's still dark and messy as hell, but I lapped up every bit of it. Hench totally surprised me by being one of the best books I read this year, and I can't say I like Villain as much (it would have been a very hard bar to reach), I'm so delighted with how this series is continuing. I think the 'problem' with Villain is that it definitely has some middle-book syndrome where it's clearly setting up a lot for later so there are long stretches where a lot is going on but little is being resolved.
That said, I just really like Anna, okay? It's that simple for me. I don't really care about plot if the characters are good and Anna (as well as the supporting cast) are great. Leviathan is bringing a whole new level of drama in this book, and weirdly I'm kind of glad that he's not...a good person. Like, he is annoying and dangerous and not great at boundaries, which makes him an unreliable boss and a pretty shitty partner. But like....he's a supervillain. I didn't want him to be this nice normal guy under the scary exterior, partially because that wouldn't make sense consider the amount of trauma he's experience and also because that would be boring to me! I want mess! There are some heartbreaking scenes in this book where his pain is at the center, and I loved those. Anna also becomes more unhinged in this one, and thank god she does! Go crazy, girl!
I love what's being built up with Quantum Entanglement/Decoherence. I love Mom as a new antagonist. I love the plot line with the other auditor. I love that Anna and June's relationship doesn't get magically fixed and that's going to be an ongoing conflict. I love Anna and Molly's presentations. I love all of the drama going on with the Future. I love Keller and Jav and Vesper and Doc Proton!!!
I need more right now (or whenever Walschots decides to put out the next book. Please, take your time. No Rush. I'm dying over here but No Rush. No, but seriously I can wait).
Thank you to Natalie Zina Walschots and William Morrow for this ARC in exchange for my full, honest review!
Happy reading!
Pre-review: I GOT THE ARC OMG GUYSSNJDJDJSKSKS
Stepping into her role as the Auditor, Anna (and the rest of Leviathan's retinue) are taking on a new foe: not a lone superhero, but the institution that empowers them, known as The Draft. In this complicated chess game of corporations, politics, violence, and (perhaps) love, is Anna a queen or just another pawn?
This series is so joy-inducing that I even had fun writing that blurb. Don't get me wrong, it's still dark and messy as hell, but I lapped up every bit of it. Hench totally surprised me by being one of the best books I read this year, and I can't say I like Villain as much (it would have been a very hard bar to reach), I'm so delighted with how this series is continuing. I think the 'problem' with Villain is that it definitely has some middle-book syndrome where it's clearly setting up a lot for later so there are long stretches where a lot is going on but little is being resolved.
That said, I just really like Anna, okay? It's that simple for me. I don't really care about plot if the characters are good and Anna (as well as the supporting cast) are great. Leviathan is bringing a whole new level of drama in this book, and weirdly I'm kind of glad that he's not...a good person. Like, he is annoying and dangerous and not great at boundaries, which makes him an unreliable boss and a pretty shitty partner. But like....he's a supervillain. I didn't want him to be this nice normal guy under the scary exterior, partially because that wouldn't make sense consider the amount of trauma he's experience and also because that would be boring to me! I want mess! There are some heartbreaking scenes in this book where his pain is at the center, and I loved those. Anna also becomes more unhinged in this one, and thank god she does! Go crazy, girl!
I love what's being built up with Quantum Entanglement/Decoherence. I love Mom as a new antagonist. I love the plot line with the other auditor. I love that Anna and June's relationship doesn't get magically fixed and that's going to be an ongoing conflict. I love Anna and Molly's presentations. I love all of the drama going on with the Future. I love Keller and Jav and Vesper and Doc Proton!!!
I need more right now (or whenever Walschots decides to put out the next book. Please, take your time. No Rush. I'm dying over here but No Rush. No, but seriously I can wait).
Thank you to Natalie Zina Walschots and William Morrow for this ARC in exchange for my full, honest review!
Happy reading!
Pre-review: I GOT THE ARC OMG GUYSSNJDJDJSKSKS
Want to Read
January 21, 2024please i will give you my firstborn child for this book i beg of you
please … i can’t wait until October
please … i can’t wait until October
Want to Read
December 5, 202512/2025, arc secured!
I've avoided arcs for months now, but I had to make an exception and apply for this one 😂
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03/16/2025, @4:35am
I've avoided arcs for months now, but I had to make an exception and apply for this one 😂
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03/16/2025, @4:35am
Want to Read
November 5, 202511/4/25: I JUST GOT AN E-ARC LET'S GOOOO
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OH MY GOD A SEQUEL???
Coming out in 2026.
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OH MY GOD A SEQUEL???
Coming out in 2026.
Want to Read
July 30, 2023this book is going to satisfy every piece of my soul I can feel it (in the meantime, I will sob until September 2024 because it’s not in my hands)
Want to Read
November 19, 2025THIS BOOK FINALLY HAS A RELEASE DATE AND A COVER??
January 16, 2026
Thank you to William Morrow and NetGalley for the ARC of this book. All opinions are my own.
I was bored and disinterested in the plot. So bored that it was truly a struggle to complete the book. This just doesn’t read the same as Hench. I understand the stories are vastly different, but the writing seems stilted and overall not as smooth. There’s a sharpness that’s missing. It feels like the reason this sequel was so long in coming is that the author didn’t have much to say. Oh, the fiendish workings of the Auditor’s team are there, but I didn’t really care about them this go ‘round. The romantic relationship felt like the publisher made the author add it to turn the series into a “slow-burn romantasy” for gimmicky reasons. There must have been some redeeming qualities but I can’t fix one in my mind to tell you about it.
I wanted to note that there are an absurd number of ellipses which often result in putting stress on words or ideas that don’t need it. That’s it. I’m done.
I was bored and disinterested in the plot. So bored that it was truly a struggle to complete the book. This just doesn’t read the same as Hench. I understand the stories are vastly different, but the writing seems stilted and overall not as smooth. There’s a sharpness that’s missing. It feels like the reason this sequel was so long in coming is that the author didn’t have much to say. Oh, the fiendish workings of the Auditor’s team are there, but I didn’t really care about them this go ‘round. The romantic relationship felt like the publisher made the author add it to turn the series into a “slow-burn romantasy” for gimmicky reasons. There must have been some redeeming qualities but I can’t fix one in my mind to tell you about it.
I wanted to note that there are an absurd number of ellipses which often result in putting stress on words or ideas that don’t need it. That’s it. I’m done.
Want to Read
March 7, 2023I am. Very. Looking forward to this.
Want to Read
September 3, 2024i'm literally only halfway through hench and i'm already foaming at the mouth for this sequel!!!!!! evil queer women who love to analyze and strategize we RISE <333333
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
I really enjoyed this - more than Hench because there was no surprise body horror. The development of The Auditor as a character with her own self-reflection is so well done and I just want Walschots to finish this series and write so many more.
December 17, 2025
Villain has quite a tonal shift from Hench; despite body horror and corporate evil and Anna descending into villainy in the first book, I found it to be kind of... lovely? I consider it a comfort book. Villain was not comforting to read, because all our beloved characters get a lot more complicated and a lot more messy. I was really impressed with how much depth Walschots was able to add to this cast of superpowered people. The bug supervillain who delivers grand monologues in the third person felt like a real person by the end of this book. And he's a bug!
I do think that at times, this exploration of Leviathan, the Auditor, and Quantum/Decoherence came at the cost of the novel's pacing. I read Hench in one sitting, but it took me almost a week to finish Villain. At first, while reading, I thought that was a bad thing, and felt a bit disappointed about the way this book meanders, the way it is sometimes character driven rather than plot driven. I was still enjoying it, but it wasn't what I had envisioned. By the halfway mark, I realized that this book actually totally slaps, and though it reads very differently from its predecessor, that isn't a bad thing.
My absolute favorite part of the book is the last chapter, which is maybe my favorite fight scene ever. I should have known I'd love it: the fight at the end of Hench was amazing, and outclassed a lot of "magic" fights I've read (or seen) before. Like, look at Marvel movies: the fight scenes have the benefit of being visual media, and yet they feel so lacking in creativity. Why do they keep reverting to just punching each other! You guys are basically magic! Walschots, on the other hand, is so creative with her fight scenes, really thinking about how these different abilities might interact with each other. She also portrays them through a kind of disturbing, realistic lens that I rarely encounter, and LOVE. The final showdown of Hench had me feeling bad for Supercollider, even though by that point I hated his guts. Walschots fight scenes are both sad and epic, the violence poignant and meaningless. Despite ending very differently to Hench, the last few pages of Villain really brought me back to the book one final fight, capturing that same incredible depth, the same conflicting emotions. I am so in awe of how she depicts of the actual cost of human suffering that is rarely captured so viscerally in other stories, whether those be Marvel blockbusters or other fantasy books.
There are perhaps a few scenes that should have been cut, namely the lengthy introductions of Draft execs that made me feel like I really was in an office meeting (although maybe that was the intention?), and while we're talking about the Draft, I gotta say that most of the Mom stuff felt directionless and more like set up for book 3, which detracted from the pacing.
TLDR: this is a very different story from hench, despite continuing its themes and having mostly the same characters. It's also really great, and if you want to see more of Anna's story, then read it!
Thank you to NetGalley for sending me this arc in exchange for an honest review!
I do think that at times, this exploration of Leviathan, the Auditor, and Quantum/Decoherence came at the cost of the novel's pacing. I read Hench in one sitting, but it took me almost a week to finish Villain. At first, while reading, I thought that was a bad thing, and felt a bit disappointed about the way this book meanders, the way it is sometimes character driven rather than plot driven. I was still enjoying it, but it wasn't what I had envisioned. By the halfway mark, I realized that this book actually totally slaps, and though it reads very differently from its predecessor, that isn't a bad thing.
My absolute favorite part of the book is the last chapter, which is maybe my favorite fight scene ever. I should have known I'd love it: the fight at the end of Hench was amazing, and outclassed a lot of "magic" fights I've read (or seen) before. Like, look at Marvel movies: the fight scenes have the benefit of being visual media, and yet they feel so lacking in creativity. Why do they keep reverting to just punching each other! You guys are basically magic! Walschots, on the other hand, is so creative with her fight scenes, really thinking about how these different abilities might interact with each other. She also portrays them through a kind of disturbing, realistic lens that I rarely encounter, and LOVE. The final showdown of Hench had me feeling bad for Supercollider, even though by that point I hated his guts. Walschots fight scenes are both sad and epic, the violence poignant and meaningless. Despite ending very differently to Hench, the last few pages of Villain really brought me back to the book one final fight, capturing that same incredible depth, the same conflicting emotions. I am so in awe of how she depicts of the actual cost of human suffering that is rarely captured so viscerally in other stories, whether those be Marvel blockbusters or other fantasy books.
There are perhaps a few scenes that should have been cut, namely the lengthy introductions of Draft execs that made me feel like I really was in an office meeting (although maybe that was the intention?), and while we're talking about the Draft, I gotta say that most of the Mom stuff felt directionless and more like set up for book 3, which detracted from the pacing.
TLDR: this is a very different story from hench, despite continuing its themes and having mostly the same characters. It's also really great, and if you want to see more of Anna's story, then read it!
Thank you to NetGalley for sending me this arc in exchange for an honest review!
December 17, 2025
Pls pls pls NetGalley, Hench was my favorite book of 2020, I have been dying for this sequel for 5 years, PLEASE MAY I HAVE THE ARC
Update: Thanks be to William Morrow, NetGalley, and most of all Natalie Zina Walschots I GOT THE ARC
Finished the book update: RTC. Pls pls pls give me a third book. It can’t end like this.
Update: Thanks be to William Morrow, NetGalley, and most of all Natalie Zina Walschots I GOT THE ARC
Finished the book update: RTC. Pls pls pls give me a third book. It can’t end like this.
November 30, 2025
ARC
In the acknowledgments the author writes that she wrote this book, wholly, four times before she was satisfied with the story. four times!!!!! fuckin 🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡 thank you for your perseverance it was a evil little joy to read
In the acknowledgments the author writes that she wrote this book, wholly, four times before she was satisfied with the story. four times!!!!! fuckin 🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡🫡 thank you for your perseverance it was a evil little joy to read
Read
April 28, 2023Two words - fuck yes.
Want to Read
May 5, 2023I NEED THIS SO MUCH
Want to Read
August 29, 2023I will be checking Edelweiss and Netgalley every week til I can finally read this. So so so excited!
March 29, 2026
This book gave me very bad vibes… book one ends with main character Anna, aka The Auditor, in a position of triumph, poised to claim her mantle as a capital-V Villain. Book two does… not go that way, despite the title.
The Auditor spends the entire first half of the book just… waiting for Leviathan to allow her to do any of her evil-for-the-greater-good plans, but Leviathan is having a bit of a mental breakdown and says no. She tries to cajole him and make him confront his feelings and he brushes her off.
At this point I’m starting to get very turned off by the unequal power dynamics between them: Leviathan controls where Anna lives, he employs her, he has a GPS tracker in her, he is so physically powerful that he could kill her as easily as breathe. And then we find out that he has the ability to spy on her (look out of her own eyeball and hear her conversations and monitor her vital signs) AT ANY TIME without Auditor being aware that it’s happening.
This is not an empowerment story. It’s a story of escalating domestic violence. Made worse when the characters become sexually involved as well. Auditor has her agency undermined or revoked multiple times; her hard (and reasonable) boundaries are negotiated down; the power imbalance forces her to justify making decisions that go against her moral code to please him because she cannot admit that her judgment is compromised because of the abuse.
This all would have been fine if Auditor did not so frequently brush it off. Or if Decoherence, the one voice of reason in this whole book, wasn’t shrugged off for no good reason. If there was an actual conversation about domestic violence / psychological abuse / emotional manipulation so that it’s obvious that the author/story are not condoning it. But that doesn’t happen. We don’t get to see Auditor turn away from the toxic environment with any permanence in this book.
I may still read book three if it really will unravel this very dangerous web that Auditor has found herself in (or at least take a very clear stance on the fact that this is Bad) but honestly even without the ick factor, this book was slow and I really didn’t like the formatting of big long sections full of long paragraphs without chapter breaks.
{Thank you HarperCollins for the advanced copy in exchange for my honest review; all thoughts are my own}
The Auditor spends the entire first half of the book just… waiting for Leviathan to allow her to do any of her evil-for-the-greater-good plans, but Leviathan is having a bit of a mental breakdown and says no. She tries to cajole him and make him confront his feelings and he brushes her off.
At this point I’m starting to get very turned off by the unequal power dynamics between them: Leviathan controls where Anna lives, he employs her, he has a GPS tracker in her, he is so physically powerful that he could kill her as easily as breathe. And then we find out that he has the ability to spy on her (look out of her own eyeball and hear her conversations and monitor her vital signs) AT ANY TIME without Auditor being aware that it’s happening.
This is not an empowerment story. It’s a story of escalating domestic violence. Made worse when the characters become sexually involved as well. Auditor has her agency undermined or revoked multiple times; her hard (and reasonable) boundaries are negotiated down; the power imbalance forces her to justify making decisions that go against her moral code to please him because she cannot admit that her judgment is compromised because of the abuse.
This all would have been fine if Auditor did not so frequently brush it off. Or if Decoherence, the one voice of reason in this whole book, wasn’t shrugged off for no good reason. If there was an actual conversation about domestic violence / psychological abuse / emotional manipulation so that it’s obvious that the author/story are not condoning it. But that doesn’t happen. We don’t get to see Auditor turn away from the toxic environment with any permanence in this book.
I may still read book three if it really will unravel this very dangerous web that Auditor has found herself in (or at least take a very clear stance on the fact that this is Bad) but honestly even without the ick factor, this book was slow and I really didn’t like the formatting of big long sections full of long paragraphs without chapter breaks.
{Thank you HarperCollins for the advanced copy in exchange for my honest review; all thoughts are my own}
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Read
April 7, 20263.8
I'm hoping there's going to be a third book, because this definitely read like a middle book.
*Review to come*
I'm hoping there's going to be a third book, because this definitely read like a middle book.
*Review to come*
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
ARC provided by Net Galley/William Morrow
I’m conflicted about this book. The first half is such a departure from the first book that I wondered how such a thing could have happened.
I reread Hench just before this one, so right off the bat, I was confused at how it ends with Levianthan stating he’s done standing in Anna’s/the Auditor’s way, but then the first half of Villain is him doing exactly that. I will, unfortunately, keep bringing it up in this review, but I am not joking when I say the first half of the book is bogged down by Levianthan and the Auditor standing around moping because they think the other doesn’t “Like Like” them anymore after the events at the end of book one. The Auditor proposes a plan, Leviathan says, “Yep sounds good. Later.” and later never comes. I kept wishing the Auditor would get fed up with Leviathan’s bullshit and the book would be about her working behind his back, and that’s what the book would be about (personally, I think my silly idea is better than what actually happened). Instead, it’s a constant back and forth between them until the two finally talk it out, and the plot can start to crawl forward.
Most notably, where Hench barely showed the Auditor interacting with anyone and instead just told us that it had happened, in Villain, the author actually took the time to show these conversations. However, it seems the author struggles with balancing character interaction and action. Book one is quickly paced because the Auditor is always in motion. She’s always doing something or something is happening to her. The lack of character interactions/dialogue further increases the pace. In book two, the action slows down to the point where the book is at a standstill so the Auditor can talk about her feelings nonstop for half the book. Even when the action finally picks up in the second half of the book, it’s still slow going. There were pages upon pages of the author going into a detailed backstory for a superhero team that I honestly had to skip because it was dragged out for so long, and I suspected that it truly wouldn’t matter that much (spoiler: I was right). Not even Supercollider got such a drawn-out segment in the previous book, and it felt like the author didn’t know what to write and was just rambling to fill the silence.
The first book was a little campy and fun, and this book attempts to take all that and make it completely serious. The vibes just are not the same, and while part of it feels like a natural progression as the author takes the story into more serious territory (not that book one didn’t have its serious moments), it also makes it feel almost completely different, as if book one and two were written by different people who were given the same storyline.
One of my biggest gripes with this book (aside from the utter disappointment of the first half) is how little the Auditor actually accomplishes in this book. Villain’s main focus is on the Auditor’s interiority. In Hench, we get the full scope of her getting injured by Supercollider to defeating him all in one book. As it’s not clear how many books this series is going to be, I expected much the same pace from Villain, and that maybe this would be a duology. The Auditor is set to take on the Draft, but everything in this book is just groundwork for some future book. It doesn’t feel like there were any significant blows attempted. The best way to think about this book is to put everything about the Draft on the back burner and instead realize that it’s actually about the Auditor’s further descent into what we as readers would describe as evil. There’s a reason for the title, after all. And while I don’t have a problem with this book being about that, and I even enjoyed some of it, it doesn’t fit with what happened in book one, and was completely unexpected.
That all said, the second half of the book is where things really pick up (though, as I said, it’s still slow in the sense that the plot doesn’t actually move all that much in this book). Personally, found it much more enjoyable and in line with what we got in Hench. While some things weren’t my favorite (I do think the Auditor should have kissed Decoherence, aka Quantum Entanglement), the second half saved the book from being a one-star read.
Something else I want to mention is that I find it interesting how in the Content Note at the very beginning of the book, the author states that there are no depictions of domestic violence, and yet that’s borderline what you would call the Auditor and Levianthan’s relationship. What, he doesn’t physically abuse her, so everything else he does that’s also mentioned in the content note doesn’t count? I’m not so sure about that. I’m not saying the author doesn’t see the purposeful toxicity she wrote into the relationship as the Auditor struggles with Leviathan’s controlling behavior the entirety of the book, but it does make me wonder what the point of it is. Maybe this will be something that could be explored more in book three, but I have no clue.
Overall, while I ended up enjoying the book a little more by the end, Villain was a let-down. Unfortunately, I think the author’s admission that she wrote the book four different times proves that she wasn’t sure where she wanted to take this book. Not only is the beginning of Villain completely disjointed and contradictory with the end of book one, but Villain isn’t cohesive with itself. The first half is such a slog, and the second feels like it could have been a book all on its own without the first half even needed. I don’t want to call this a bad book, but as a sequel, it should have been better. As I said, I did end up enjoying myself, but at the same time, I was also disappointed that the book ended before the Auditor was able to accomplish much outside of her character growth and becoming a worse person.
At this point, as much as Hench has been a favorite of mine since I first read it years ago, I don’t know if I’ll read book three whenever it’s released. I don’t know if I can wait yet another six years between releases just to potentially read a book that doesn’t feel like it belongs with the others. While I won’t say this book isn’t worth reading, you definitely need to temper your expectations if you loved Hench before you start Villain.
I’m conflicted about this book. The first half is such a departure from the first book that I wondered how such a thing could have happened.
I reread Hench just before this one, so right off the bat, I was confused at how it ends with Levianthan stating he’s done standing in Anna’s/the Auditor’s way, but then the first half of Villain is him doing exactly that. I will, unfortunately, keep bringing it up in this review, but I am not joking when I say the first half of the book is bogged down by Levianthan and the Auditor standing around moping because they think the other doesn’t “Like Like” them anymore after the events at the end of book one. The Auditor proposes a plan, Leviathan says, “Yep sounds good. Later.” and later never comes. I kept wishing the Auditor would get fed up with Leviathan’s bullshit and the book would be about her working behind his back, and that’s what the book would be about (personally, I think my silly idea is better than what actually happened). Instead, it’s a constant back and forth between them until the two finally talk it out, and the plot can start to crawl forward.
Most notably, where Hench barely showed the Auditor interacting with anyone and instead just told us that it had happened, in Villain, the author actually took the time to show these conversations. However, it seems the author struggles with balancing character interaction and action. Book one is quickly paced because the Auditor is always in motion. She’s always doing something or something is happening to her. The lack of character interactions/dialogue further increases the pace. In book two, the action slows down to the point where the book is at a standstill so the Auditor can talk about her feelings nonstop for half the book. Even when the action finally picks up in the second half of the book, it’s still slow going. There were pages upon pages of the author going into a detailed backstory for a superhero team that I honestly had to skip because it was dragged out for so long, and I suspected that it truly wouldn’t matter that much (spoiler: I was right). Not even Supercollider got such a drawn-out segment in the previous book, and it felt like the author didn’t know what to write and was just rambling to fill the silence.
The first book was a little campy and fun, and this book attempts to take all that and make it completely serious. The vibes just are not the same, and while part of it feels like a natural progression as the author takes the story into more serious territory (not that book one didn’t have its serious moments), it also makes it feel almost completely different, as if book one and two were written by different people who were given the same storyline.
One of my biggest gripes with this book (aside from the utter disappointment of the first half) is how little the Auditor actually accomplishes in this book. Villain’s main focus is on the Auditor’s interiority. In Hench, we get the full scope of her getting injured by Supercollider to defeating him all in one book. As it’s not clear how many books this series is going to be, I expected much the same pace from Villain, and that maybe this would be a duology. The Auditor is set to take on the Draft, but everything in this book is just groundwork for some future book. It doesn’t feel like there were any significant blows attempted. The best way to think about this book is to put everything about the Draft on the back burner and instead realize that it’s actually about the Auditor’s further descent into what we as readers would describe as evil. There’s a reason for the title, after all. And while I don’t have a problem with this book being about that, and I even enjoyed some of it, it doesn’t fit with what happened in book one, and was completely unexpected.
That all said, the second half of the book is where things really pick up (though, as I said, it’s still slow in the sense that the plot doesn’t actually move all that much in this book). Personally, found it much more enjoyable and in line with what we got in Hench. While some things weren’t my favorite (I do think the Auditor should have kissed Decoherence, aka Quantum Entanglement), the second half saved the book from being a one-star read.
Something else I want to mention is that I find it interesting how in the Content Note at the very beginning of the book, the author states that there are no depictions of domestic violence, and yet that’s borderline what you would call the Auditor and Levianthan’s relationship. What, he doesn’t physically abuse her, so everything else he does that’s also mentioned in the content note doesn’t count? I’m not so sure about that. I’m not saying the author doesn’t see the purposeful toxicity she wrote into the relationship as the Auditor struggles with Leviathan’s controlling behavior the entirety of the book, but it does make me wonder what the point of it is. Maybe this will be something that could be explored more in book three, but I have no clue.
Overall, while I ended up enjoying the book a little more by the end, Villain was a let-down. Unfortunately, I think the author’s admission that she wrote the book four different times proves that she wasn’t sure where she wanted to take this book. Not only is the beginning of Villain completely disjointed and contradictory with the end of book one, but Villain isn’t cohesive with itself. The first half is such a slog, and the second feels like it could have been a book all on its own without the first half even needed. I don’t want to call this a bad book, but as a sequel, it should have been better. As I said, I did end up enjoying myself, but at the same time, I was also disappointed that the book ended before the Auditor was able to accomplish much outside of her character growth and becoming a worse person.
At this point, as much as Hench has been a favorite of mine since I first read it years ago, I don’t know if I’ll read book three whenever it’s released. I don’t know if I can wait yet another six years between releases just to potentially read a book that doesn’t feel like it belongs with the others. While I won’t say this book isn’t worth reading, you definitely need to temper your expectations if you loved Hench before you start Villain.
Want to Read
April 2, 2024I hate that Assistant to the Villain has been attached to this book because that one was pretty bad (very juvenile, definitely should've been Young Adult) and Hench was ridiculously amazing, I loved it so much. I don't know who made that decision but they're not even remotely on the same level; it's like mentioning Twilight when recommending Anne Rice or Dracula, just because they all have vampires. Hopefully it gets removed from the official promotions later, but probably not unfortunately. Very much looking forward to Right Hand!
Want to Read
September 18, 2024update 9/17/24: still missing hench. had a notification that this was supposed to be published today but it’s ok bc it’s coming august 2025 🤞🤞🤞 + name change and synopsis hype?!
update 12/27/23: i’m reading the assistant to the villain rn bc i thought it could fill the hench shaped hole in my heart. it is in fact making me miss hench more and more. i need this sequel so bad to cope pls pls pls i’m this close to rereading hench now bc i miss it sm💀
GIVE IT TO ME NOWWWWWW. please
update 12/27/23: i’m reading the assistant to the villain rn bc i thought it could fill the hench shaped hole in my heart. it is in fact making me miss hench more and more. i need this sequel so bad to cope pls pls pls i’m this close to rereading hench now bc i miss it sm💀
GIVE IT TO ME NOWWWWWW. please
Want to Read
January 7, 2026literally going feral waiting for this
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
Thank you to NetGalley and to William Morrow for the ARC of Villain by Natalie Zina Walschots.
I stumbled upon Hench in August 2025, and was thrilled to be able to access the sequel early. I know many fans have been waiting since 2020, and Zina Walschots addresses the wait in her end author notes. Since 2020 she has fully rewritten the story 4 times to get it right, and I hope any readers enjoying the story see those efforts in this excellent continuation.
I do disagree with the summary comparing this to Assistant to the Villain and Starter Villain -- though it still is definitely more in line with The Boys. Compared to Hench, Villain is darker with briefer bouts of levity. It is less plot driven, and more character driven as The Auditor fully begins to embrace what she is becoming as the right hand to Leviathan.
This book is less about hijinks to make superheroes have a bad day, though the day-to-day humdrum of accounting and marketing villainy does continue -- and I did miss some of that consistent continuing hilarity in Villain, Instead, the book is about the traumatic effects of the closing events of Hench, and then The Auditor's slow rise in a world that now has a void in superhero supremacy and what she is willing to do to maintain control.
If there is to be a third book, which I can see the outlines and parallels stirring from what we learn in the first two to lead to a third, it makes sense that so much of this book is character driven. In Hench, Anna is seeking revenge over something she can tangibly hate. In Villain, the Auditor's boss no longer has an archnemesis, just the hydra that creates heroes, and so her role has to expand and reform and she has to determine her own limits in this fight. Is removing the superhero that harmed her enough? Does she need to delve deeper into physically harmful villainy instead of marketing tricks? Should she trust her villain? Can she control anything? Is there a count of her own crimes that will turn her back or will she still push forward? She has to figure out if she could just be a heroic baby villain who took down a bad superhero, or if she must descend deeper and she has to come to terms with all of these thoughts and pressures, all while serving an upper management role.
Again, this book does feel darker than Hench. Hench had more physical violence, but Villain is fully of psychological violence and physical violence. The Auditor has less friendships than in Hench, and that bit of loneliness and isolation, even in the relationships she has left, also makes the story feel edgier and puts the Auditor to trusting people Anna never would have. It's all very well done, but with more sparse bits of levity, the reading experience is harsher. This is what Zina Walschots does so well in this book -- you feel like you are descending into darkness with the Auditor and you understand why she isn't climbing back up.
A gritty read, but an excellent and compelling continuation of the Auditor's arc.
I stumbled upon Hench in August 2025, and was thrilled to be able to access the sequel early. I know many fans have been waiting since 2020, and Zina Walschots addresses the wait in her end author notes. Since 2020 she has fully rewritten the story 4 times to get it right, and I hope any readers enjoying the story see those efforts in this excellent continuation.
I do disagree with the summary comparing this to Assistant to the Villain and Starter Villain -- though it still is definitely more in line with The Boys. Compared to Hench, Villain is darker with briefer bouts of levity. It is less plot driven, and more character driven as The Auditor fully begins to embrace what she is becoming as the right hand to Leviathan.
This book is less about hijinks to make superheroes have a bad day, though the day-to-day humdrum of accounting and marketing villainy does continue -- and I did miss some of that consistent continuing hilarity in Villain, Instead, the book is about the traumatic effects of the closing events of Hench, and then The Auditor's slow rise in a world that now has a void in superhero supremacy and what she is willing to do to maintain control.
If there is to be a third book, which I can see the outlines and parallels stirring from what we learn in the first two to lead to a third, it makes sense that so much of this book is character driven. In Hench, Anna is seeking revenge over something she can tangibly hate. In Villain, the Auditor's boss no longer has an archnemesis, just the hydra that creates heroes, and so her role has to expand and reform and she has to determine her own limits in this fight. Is removing the superhero that harmed her enough? Does she need to delve deeper into physically harmful villainy instead of marketing tricks? Should she trust her villain? Can she control anything? Is there a count of her own crimes that will turn her back or will she still push forward? She has to figure out if she could just be a heroic baby villain who took down a bad superhero, or if she must descend deeper and she has to come to terms with all of these thoughts and pressures, all while serving an upper management role.
Again, this book does feel darker than Hench. Hench had more physical violence, but Villain is fully of psychological violence and physical violence. The Auditor has less friendships than in Hench, and that bit of loneliness and isolation, even in the relationships she has left, also makes the story feel edgier and puts the Auditor to trusting people Anna never would have. It's all very well done, but with more sparse bits of levity, the reading experience is harsher. This is what Zina Walschots does so well in this book -- you feel like you are descending into darkness with the Auditor and you understand why she isn't climbing back up.
A gritty read, but an excellent and compelling continuation of the Auditor's arc.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Like any good second book of a trilogy, this book is full of angst and loss, sour tastes and uncomfortable situations as the Auditor goes from being — well, okay, it’s in the title. She’s no longer a hench, she’s coming into her own villainy, but doing so with her eyes averted as if she can avoid really seeing what she’s doing, really making the choice. It’s one thing to be against Drift, it’s another to start taking real people apart; it’s one thing to follow orders, or make suggestions and have the boss accept them, and quite another to be giving the orders.
This is a very introspective book, even though quite a bit is happening. First there’s the slow romance between Leviathan and Auditor which is a wonderfully intimate and terrible thing; Leviathan is not a good person; he’s a villain, through and through. He enjoys control and power, and views romance through a very inhuman lens, leaving the Auditor both enamored and afraid, delighted by the trust and connection, and afraid of the depth of Leviathan’s interference in her life. Her handling of that giant red flag was very well done, true to character, and handled in a very, very smart way.
Then there’s the office politics of it all, the upcoming next generation — from a mini Auditor to a new collection of superheroes — and how Drift uses people, much as Auditor and Leviathan do. But Leviathan is one being and more personal; Drift is a giant conglomeration with too many hands at the wheel and decisions that feel like they’re made by a boardroom or a thinktank rather than actual trainers.
This book gets dark, and Auditor doesn’t come across as a great person. Which is the to the point, and I honestly can’t wait to see how the third book resolves her relationship with … everyone around her. From Leviathan to the baby heroes to Mom.
However, I’m going to be honest. The first half of this book dragged, for me. There was a lot of wheel spinning, a lot of workplace meetings, a lot of superhero world building and … I’m not big into superheroes. I was bored. Thanks to the writing it was easy to read, but every time I put it down I had to remind myself to pick it back up. And then, after the eyeball thing, the pace really picked up with more emotion and action and momentum and I finished the last half in a single session.
If you loved the superhero aspects of Hench, you’re going to love Villain as it goes into far more detail about superpowers, superheroes, and superhero management. The world building is immaculate, and the writing is strong. But it’s a slow start. If you’re not into superheroes you might not enjoy this one as much as the first one, but I do think it’s worth a read if you like character studies. Auditor is fascinating, and very sympathetic. I don’t agree with her choices, but I can see how she got from point A to point B.
Thank you so very, very much to Net Galley and the publisher for the ARC!
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