Vicious

Vicious
V.E. Schwab
Fantasy
364 pages (paperback)

Plot:

V.E. Schwab brings to life the gritty, fast paced superhero filled novel that I had been looking for for a long time. The novel centers around two egotistic but intellectual college students, Victor and Eli. When presented with a class thesis and research project, Eli shows his interest in EOs. ExtraOrdinary people.

At first Victor brushes off his friends interest as just fantasy until Eli comes up with a startling discovery. Every EO recorded has had a near death experience; dying and being revived.

This sparks an idea with Victor. Why not take Eli's thesis from theoretical to concrete? So they come up with a plan. Victor overdoses on drugs, expectant of Eli to revive him. But it fails; Eli freaks and calls the police and Victor is brought around too soon.

But Eli is determined, and his try works. He dies and Victor is successful in bringing Eli back. And they soon discover Eli has the power to heal himself. Basically, he's immortal.

However, Eli is tentative to try again with Victor. Victor becomes jealous, and decides to take matters into his own hands. He talks Eli's girlfriend, Angie, into killing him and electrocuting him back. The plan succeeds, but Victors power is a little different; he can control pain.

But when Victor is brought around and has no control over his power, and as he tries to fight his own extreme pain, he ends up over loading Angie and killing her.

Enraged, Eli sets Victor up and he is sent to jail. Ten years later, Victor, having plenty of time to harness his power, breaks out of jail bent on revenge. Eli, on the other hand has vowed to rid the world of all EOs, believing that their power made them evil, except for his beautiful sidekick.

Both sides are armed with terrible power, but who will end up alive?

I can't tell you, it would ruin the book.

Review:

I have to say, I absolutely fell in love with this book. The plot was very well thought up, and while it was not so mysterious as I couldn't guess as to what the twist in the end might be, it kept me on the edge of my seat.

The characters were very well written. Sociopathic, but they weren't so far gone that you were unable to like any of them, but enough that they danced a very fine line between “this character is amazing” and “I absolutely do not like him”. The entire novel, which I think Schwab did this fantastically, I was unable to tell whowasright and who was wrong. You think there for a bit thinking Eli was, but then he would go off and kill someone, so you'd think Victor. But then Victor would go do something and you'd just be sitting there like, “what?”.

My only thing was the way the novel was written. It was more of a narrative, and while I loved how the timeline flowed (from ten years ago, to two weeks ago, to two hours ago), the writing was a little slow and not as captivating near the beginning when everything was being introduced until the plot really started to kick in.

But, when it did, I couldn't set the book down.

Rating:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

My very first words (sort of...)

Ah, blogging… I've long considered taking you up, but between writing, reading and generally having life to tend to, you've always seemed to be such a time consumer.

But yet, here I am. Yay!

To be honest, I wasn't quite sure what to write here… It's the first post on a brand new blog. I have no followers, no readers, no one has heard of ‘Callie’ in the writing world (yet), and I'm expected to write to people.

So I've come up with a plan. I'm not going to write to the reader (no offense to you reading this that decided to come have a look), I'll write it to you, dear blog. This inanimate publishing tool I am using to hopefully spread joy out to those reading this.

And I imagine now, I should maybe say a little about who I am? Yes?

To start off, I live in Washington. No, I'm not going to disclose where in Washington, except for the fact that it rains where I am. Quite a lot. I also have a dog. Her name is Daisy. She is currently sitting on my feet as I write this.

Let's see…

I'm currently writing a novel. Hopefully I become a published author. As I gain more followers and readers, more readers like you, I'll keep you posted on how that's going.

Maybe.

I’m also an artist. And, here is the whole reason this blog was born… A reader.

The point of this blog is to add a little bit of humor, but mostly throw out great book suggestions. I know myself that I constantly look for new reads, and blogs are some of my favorite places to find some of my favorite books. And now hopefully you, Reader, can find a new favorite here too.

Except not yet, since this is the first post, and there's nothing really here.

But soon, Reader, you'll  be six seconds to literature.