Name: If We Were Villains
Rating: 4.270381328073635 (1521 reviews)
ISBN: 9781250095282

M. L. Rio

Entreated to tell his side of the story to a detective who put him in prison a decade earlier for a murder he may not have committed, Oliver Marks describes his past as a Shakespearean actor in college whose rivalry with a castmate escalated in dangerous ways.

A Novel

If We Were Villains

Lexi D

For someone who loved words as much as I did, it was amazing how often they failed me. 

Lieke Nieuwlaat 

giuli

Ashlyn Barrett

Aimee :)

Florence

How tremendous the agony of unmade decisions. 

erin alise 

María | @AltroReader

You can justify anything if you do it poetically enough. 

Julia Acd

Bianca Miller 

Emma Hak-Kovacs

Lili V Guba

"You can justify anything if you do it poetically enough."

rini

Emily McMeans

Tija

zee ✨️

︎ ︎ ︎Demian

Victoria Justice

Stephanie 

Heather

Luna 🌙

Amanda Autumn Berrey

“You can justify anything if you do it poetically enough.”

darby

Larissa Campos

Clara Gauthier

But that is how a tragedy like ours or King Lear breaks your heart—by making you believe that the ending might still be happy, until the very last minute.

kemi

Abby Lane

Finja Papendorf

Emerson Clute

"I think you understand it perfectly. Nothing makes sense to him either. His whole world is falling apart, and once he realizes he can't stop it or fix it or change it, there's only one thing left to do." My eyes adjusted slowly, maddeningly.

 “What's that?" His shadow shrugged in the gloom. "

hana

Our last isolated, innocent moment; the stillness that precedes the blows and billows of a storm.

"I never wanted you to look at me the way you're looking at me right now."

Zwetschge

 You can't do good work if you're hiding, so we're going to get all of the ugliness out in the open.

Mumtaz Obsiye

I’m having a hard time trying to find the words to describe how i feel about this book (am i Oliver right now). But basically to me the murder mystery felt like a subplot,  this was more like a ‘art imitates life’, I like this book when i think of it as a story about Shakespeare students who’s life starts to become parallel with Shakespeare characters. Which it is tbf, the characters in the book and the characters they play are constantly blurring lines. It was a true tragedy tho.  
In the end I’m giving this 4 ⭐️ purely for Shakespeare, and how the Dellecher students mirror the characters of Shakespeare plays.
<spoiler> And Oliver was selfish and a prick, i hated how he acted towards Mer, like she was just an object. He was so in his head about everything and whiny and I don’t trust him as a narrator. And his martyr act and taking up James’ place in prison made everything worse for James. Pip felt flat as well even though i wanted to love her and did love what she did for James but there was nothing else to her, same with Wren and Alexander. He was just funny and sassy and an addict. 
</spoiler>

glad i read this finally but i wouldn’t read it again 

cee 

Chanel

More like 4.75 <br />I can’t believe it has taken me this long to read this novel! 

M.L. Rio

If we were villains

coco nini

loved the writing, but honestlyyy,, kinda wished the author delved more into how evil and mean richard was. by the time they left him to die,,, i didn’t really feel like their reasons were justifiable enough. either way, great book!

'Enter the players. There were seven of us then, seven bright young things with wide precious futures ahead of us. Until that year, we saw no further than the books in front of our faces.'On the day Oliver Marks is released from jail, the man who put him there is waiting at the door. Detective Colborne wants to know the truth, and after ten years, Oliver is finally ready to tell it.Ten years before: Oliver is one of seven young Shakespearean actors at Dellecher Classical Conservatory, a place of keen ambition and fierce competition. In this secluded world of firelight and leather-bound books, Oliver and his friends play the same roles onstage and off: hero, villain, tyrant, temptress, ingenue, extra. But in their fourth and final year, the balance of power begins to shift, good-natured rivalries turned ugly, and on opening night real violence invades the students' world of make believe. In the morning, the fourth-years find themselves facing their very own tragedy, and their greatest acting challenge yet: convincing the police, each other, and themselves that they are innocent.Part coming-of-age story, part confession, If We Were Villains explores the magical and dangerous boundary between art and life. In this tale of loyalty and betrayal, madness and ecstasy, the players must choose what roles to play before the curtain falls.

If We Were Villains by M. L. Rio ⭐⭐⭐⭐

okay, I was hooked at the TSH, that's why I read another book like it. Performers! I can see each of the character's dedication and passion to being actors. they're really great! to be honest, I was literally crying at the last pages of the book, I didn't expect the plot twists. i felt sad for all of them, the play ruined them. overall, i loved their aesthetic!

stephie

If We Were Villains by M. L. Rio ⭐⭐⭐⭐
okay, I was hooked at the TSH, that's why I read another book like it. Performers! I can see each of the character's dedication and passion to being actors. they're really great! to be honest, I was literally crying at the last pages of the book, I didn't expect the plot twists. i felt sad for all of them, the play ruined them. overall, i loved their aesthetic!

On the day Oliver Marks is released from jail, the man who put him there is waiting at the door. Detective Colborne wants to know the thruth, and after ten years, Olver is finally ready to tell it. 
A decade ago: Oliver is one of seven young Shakespearean actors at Dellecher Classical Conservatory, a place of keen ambition and fierce competition. In this secluded world of firelight and leather-bound books, Oliver and his friends play the same roles onstage and off: hero, villain, tyrant, temptress, ingénue, extra.
But in their fourth and final year, good-natured rivalries turn ugly, and on opening night real violence invades the students' world of make-believe. In the morning, the fourth-years find themselves facing their very own tragedy, and their greatest acting challenge yet: convince the police, each other, and themselves that they are innocent.

Yulez

i'm a sucker for found family, so pairing it with dark academia makes for a good cup of tea. unfortunately, i am nowhere near the level of conversance our cast has on shakespeare, but i can appreciate how much he permeates the narrative; nice glimpse into the works of literature's greatest.

i read The Secret History right before this so, perhaps as a residual sentiment, i didn't quite expect to like the characters as much as i did—oliver was the biggest surprise. they're all fucked up in a way but as theater folk even that just made me nostalgic (of course, not to the degree of you-know-what).

if i were to nitpick one thing, however, there's some dissatisfaction in terms of character exploration. i had an early vested interest in meredith, alexander, and filippa (sorry wren) but i feel like i barely got to scratch the surface of their psyches.

real ✰: 4.25

i'm a sucker for found family, so pairing it with dark academia makes for a good cup of tea. unfortunately, i am nowhere near the level of conversance our cast has on shakespeare, but i can appreciate how much he permeates the narrative; nice glimpse into the works of literature's greatest.

i read The Secret History right before this so, perhaps as a residual sentiment, i didn't quite expect to like the characters as much as i did—oliver was the biggest surprise. they're all fucked up in a way but as theater folk even that just made me nostalgic (of course, not to the degree of you-know-what).

if i were to nitpick one thing, however, there's some dissatisfaction in terms of character exploration. i had an early vested interest in meredith, alexander, and filippa (sorry wren) but i feel like i barely got to scratch the surface of their psyches.

De todos os livros que li e um dia acabei esquecendo os acontecimentos, esse nunca será o caso. Cada página está gravada no fundo da minha alma e eu poderia falar sobre por horas e horas, sem parar. Estou em um estado de desespero andando de um lado para o outro com o final e sinceramente só tem uma pessoa que eu queria falar sobre, mesmo sabendo que não é uma possibilidade. É de quebrar o coração, e eu sigo escolhendo esses livros como se meu coração aguentasse muita coisa ainda.

Coupable ou non coupable ? Telle est la question... Oliver Marks termine de purger sa peine de dix ans de prison pour un meurtre qu'il n’a peut-être pas commis. Le jour de sa libération, il est accueilli par l’inspecteur Colborne, l’homme qui l’a mis en prison. Ce dernier prend sa retraite, mais avant cela, il veut savoir ce qui s’est réellement passé il y a dix ans... Au sein d’un groupe de sept jeunes acteurs étudiant l’œuvre de Shakespeare dans une académie artistique d’excellence, Oliver et ses amis jouent les mêmes rôles sur scène et dans la vie : le héros, le méchant, le tyran, la tentatrice, l’ingénue... Mais lorsque la distribution change et que les seconds rôles remplacent les stars, tout tourne au drame et l’un d’entre eux est retrouvé mort. Les survivants sont alors confrontés à leur plus grand défi d’acteur : convaincre la police, et surtout eux-mêmes, de leur innocence. Le phénomène TikTok enfin traduit en France et bientôt adapté sur Netflix ! « Faisant écho à des romans tels que Le Maître des illusions de Donna Tartt et au théâtre shakespearien, le premier roman de M.L. Rio est une aventure sombre et captivante. Elle nous dresse un portrait complexe de l’amitié, de l’amour et de la trahison. Chaudement recommandé à ceux qui adorent l’œuvre de Donna Tartt. » - Library Journal « Ce roman sur l’obsession vous obsédera jusqu’au lever du soleil. » - Kirkus « Il s’agit d’un roman rare et extraordinaire : une description vivante du monde secret des académies, une exploration tendre et déchirante de l’amitié, et un thriller littéraire véritablement époustouflant. Je ne saurais trop vous recommander ce livre et j’ai hâte de lire les prochains romans de M.L. Rio. » - Emily St. John Mandel « Une intrigue digne de Shakespeare lui-même... qui se clôt sur un twist stupéfiant. Ceux qui aiment les thrillers littéraires et Donna Tartt vont adorer ! » - Booklist « Attention : une fois que vous aurez commencé ce roman, vous ne pourrez plus le reposer. Vous voilà prévenus... » - Publishers Weekly

୨ৎ : “actors are by nature volatile—alchemic creatures composed of incendiary elements, emotion and ego and envy. heat them up, stir them together, and sometimes you get gold. sometimes disaster.”

this book was.... well alot. while i felt connected to each of them. reading from olivers pov was somewhat misleading but i found myself trusting every word he said. he could have told me the sky was bright green and id say 'you know what hell yeah.'

richard, while a fucking raging dick. i find myself thinking of the what ifs. would he have changed? gotten worse? theres so many underlying questions regarding him. 

i wish wren and alexander were more apart of the story, we glossed over the health issues after and i found i wanted a little more answers. 

filippa and james, i feel they can do no wrong. while james was way more complex than i thought he would be i loved him. 

hes not dead i refuse him and oliver are happily married THANK YEW

and oliver, my sweet baby. he was nice, good and yes naive, but he loved everyone to a fault and i want him to be happy with every fibre of my being. 

this book was not what i was expecting and even though Shakespeare makes my head hurt, this was so beautifully written and i feel in love with it. 

୨ৎ : “actors are by nature volatile—alchemic creatures composed of incendiary elements, emotion and ego and envy. heat them up, stir them together, and sometimes you get gold. sometimes disaster.”

— ☆ 4/5

this book was.... well alot. while i felt connected to each of them. reading from olivers pov was somewhat misleading but i found myself trusting every word he said. he could have told me the sky was bright green and id say 'you know what hell yeah.'

richard, while a fucking raging dick. i find myself thinking of the what ifs. would he have changed? gotten worse? theres so many underlying questions regarding him. 

meredith was complex but i did love her.

i wish wren and alexander were more apart of the story, we glossed over the health issues after and i found i wanted a little more answers. 

filippa and james, i feel they can do no wrong. while james was way more complex than i thought he would be i loved him. hes not dead i refuse him and oliver are happily married THANK YEW

and oliver, my sweet baby. he was nice, good and yes naive, but he loved everyone to a fault and i want him to be happy with every fibre of my being. 

this book was not what i was expecting and even though Shakespeare makes my head hurt, this was so beautifully written and i feel in love with it. 

As my entry to dark academia (late, je sais) this was a feast 

Annabella

Absolutely stellar. My first copy from years ago got destroyed before I could finish it. The portion of that copy prior to its destruction sank its teeth into me so deeply that I continually felt the need to repurchase it. Many years later, I finally got around to doing so and it did not disappoint.

Cenedra

i loved the shakespeare atmosphere throughout the book and the main vibe of everything. i would say the lack of depth in some relationships between characters felt amiss in the book. some dynamics were awkward, i dare say for example between richard and wren who are cousins but we see nothing of their relationships so we do not understand some of their reaction towards each other’s. i would have loved more description of every characters and their relation to each others but alas! the book was good nonetheless and i loved the dramatics of all the plays and how mysterious the teachers were being.

mari

'Enter the players. There were seven of us then, seven bright young things with wide precious futures ahead of us. Until that year, we saw no further than the books in front of our faces.' On the day Oliver Marks is released from jail, the man who put him there is waiting at the door. Detective Colborne wants to know the truth, and after ten years, Oliver is finally ready to tell it. Ten years before: Oliver is one of seven young Shakespearean actors at Dellecher Classical Conservatory, a place of keen ambition and fierce competition. In this secluded world of firelight and leather-bound books, Oliver and his friends play the same roles onstage and off: hero, villain, tyrant, temptress, ingénue, extra. But in their fourth and final year, the balance of power begins to shift, good-natured rivalries turned ugly, and on opening night real violence invades the students' world of make believe. In the morning, the fourth years find themselves facing their very own tragedy, and their greatest acting challenge yet: convincing the police, each other, and themselves that they are innocent. Part coming-of-age story, part confession, If We Were Villains explores the magical and dangerous boundary between art and life. In this tale of loyalty and betrayal, madness and ecstasy, the players must choose what roles to play before the curtain falls.

Ivy Dena

I am NOT okay. It was a brilliant, brilliant story, but I am not okay after this...

Agnese

Oliver Marks has just served ten years for the murder of one of his closest friends - a murder he may or may not have committed. On the day he's released, he's greeted by the detective who put him in prison. Detective Colborne is retiring, but before he does, he wants to know what really happened ten years ago. As a young actor studying Shakespeare at an elite arts conservatory, Oliver noticed that his talented classmates seem to play the same roles onstage and off - villain, hero, tyrant, temptress - though Oliver felt doomed to always be a secondary character in someone else's story. But when the teachers change up the casting, a good-natured rivalry turns ugly, and the plays spill dangerously over into life. When tragedy strikes, one of the seven friends is found dead. The rest face their greatest acting challenge yet: convincing the police, and themselves, that they are blameless.

gay people be doing anything but saying I love you 

Claire Maguet

initially had a hard time getting into the book bc i was so self aware of how pretentious it was but once i could fully get into it i was so into it. 

yet another shakespeare-inspired novel that has left me audibly sobbing when i finished it. i loved it so much. oliver was my perfect narrator, my perfect main character, even more so because he always saw himself as secondary (real!). 

the reality of dellecher was wonderfully separated from the real world in an almost fantastical sense and yet also felt so real and physical. 

also the queerness in this novel is so special to me—it’s not pretty, and it probably isn’t healthy, but what’s a dark academia novel without some unhealthy codependency? 

anyway, i’m so glad i finally got around to reading this book after being recommended it like 3 years ago. 

initially had a hard time getting into the book bc i was so self aware of how pretentious it was but once i could fully get into it i was so into it. 

yet another shakespeare-inspired novel that has left me audibly sobbing when i finished it. i loved it so much. oliver was my perfect narrator, my perfect main character, even more so because he always saw himself as secondary (real!). 

the reality of dellecher was wonderfully separated from the real world in an almost fantastical sense and yet also felt so real and physical. 

also the queerness in this novel is so special to me—it’s not pretty, and it probably isn’t healthy, but what’s a dark academia novel without some unhealthy codependency? 

anyway, i’m so glad i finally got around to reading this book after being recommended it like 3 years ago. 

it's really hard to put into words how i feel about the ending of this book but i just wish since we know james is alive that he and oliver are reunited and happy together. at first i thought it was oliver who killed richard, that he was drunk and didn't remember, but over time i thought that maybe someone else killed him and oliver took the blame, and then of course i thought of james. i had tears in my eyes when pip said james was gone and that rarely happens to me. i loved how they spoke in shakespeare quotes even though i barely understood them. this is a book i will definitely miss reading. i will miss oliver and james.

victor

Ally Perkins

This is one of my favourite books of all time. Is it almost exactly a copy of The Secret History? Yes, sort of, but I enjoyed it about 100 times more. It’s relatively simple, in some cases even predictable, but it really captured me and I’ll always come back to it when I don’t know what to read. What can I say? It’s Shakespeare and gay people, and I’m easily pleased.

Grace Stanger

fiquei devastadoramente miserável e completamente viciado

Pedro Rodarte

khush

a very enjoyable read to savour during the quiet days of autumn! i liked the setting and how the twisted mystery developed till the very end, but it's also not quite the masterpiece i expected from the reviews. the characters felt at times a bit one-dimensional, and the way everybody was quoting shakespeare all the time was a bit annoying (look, i know how unhinged theatre kids can be, but really, making them speak in quotes right after they indirectly killed their classmate...). other than that, i really appreciate the creativity that went into other aspects of the book, like how both structure and writing style are clearly inspired by plays (that exeunt omnes on the very last page made me smile from ear to ear), plus it's not overly heavy and flows very well. it's one of those i could easily reread!

Selle raamatu esteetika ja dark academia vibe oli lihtsalt IMMACULATE. Väga thought daughter raamat, pani mind mõtlema väga sügavate teemade peale. Ülesehitus ja karakterid olid nii hästi läbimõeldud, selle ülesehitus sarnanes väga Shakespearile, kellest raamatus VÄGA palju juttu on. Lõpp pani mind hämmingus lage vaatama (heartbraking). ALSO plot oli AAAMAZING.

“Per aspera, ad astra” (thorugh the horns, to the stars)

“I look at you and suddenly the sonnets make sense, the good ones anyway”

“You can justify anything if you do it poetically enough”

“Do you blame shakespeare for any of it? I blame him for all of it”

Mia Lisandra 

Selle raamatu esteetika ja dark academia vibe oli lihtsalt IMMACULATE. Väga thought daughter raamat, pani mind mõtlema väga sügavate teemade peale. Ülesehitus ja karakterid olid nii hästi läbimõeldud, selle ülesehitus sarnanes väga Shakespearile, kellest raamatus VÄGA palju juttu on. Lõpp pani mind hämmingus lage vaatama (heartbraking). ALSO plot oli AAAMAZING.

Mõned quoted:

“Per aspera, ad astra” (thorugh the horns, to the stars)

“I look at you and suddenly the sonnets make sense, the good ones anyway”

“You can justify anything if you do it poetically enough”

“Do you blame shakespeare for any of it? I blame him for all of it”



If We Were Villains A Novel

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