Because You Love to Hate Me
Books | Juvenile Fiction / Fairy Tales & Folklore / General
3.4
Ameriie
Leave it to the heroes to save the world--villains just want to rule the world. In this unique YA anthology, thirteen acclaimed, bestselling authors team up with thirteen influential BookTubers to reimagine fairy tales from the oft-misunderstood villains' points of view. These fractured, unconventional spins on classics like "Medusa," Sherlock Holmes, and "Jack and the Beanstalk" provide a behind-the-curtain look at villains' acts of vengeance, defiance, and rage--and the pain, heartbreak, and sorrow that spurned them on. No fairy tale will ever seem quite the same again!Featuring writing from . . .Authors: Ren?e Ahdieh, Ameriie, Soman Chainani, Susan Dennard, Sarah Enni, Marissa Meyer, Cindy Pon, Victoria Schwab, Samantha Shannon, Adam Silvera, Andrew Smith, April Genevieve Tucholke, and Nicola YoonBookTubers: Benjamin Alderson (Benjaminoftomes), Sasha Alsberg (abookutopia), Whitney Atkinson (WhittyNovels), Tina Burke (ChristinaReadsYA blog and TheLushables), Catriona Feeney (LittleBookOwl), Jesse George (JessetheReader), Zo? Herdt (readbyzoe), Samantha Lane (Thoughts on Tomes), Sophia Lee (thebookbasement), Raeleen Lemay (padfootandprongs07), Regan Perusse (PeruseProject), Christine Riccio (polandbananasBOOKS), and Steph Sinclair & Kat Kennedy (Cuddlebuggery blog and channel).
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Author
Ameriie
Pages
352
Publisher
Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Published Date
2017-07-13
ISBN
1408882760 9781408882764
Community ReviewsSee all
"I was so excited to see this book in the library last month. Didn't think I'd get to read it for a while, but thank goodness it has such a memorable cover, otherwise I would have had to wait longer. And, by the way, the cover is everything~! All of these stories were written beautifully. I don't think I've read something like this for a long time, if ever. Read this if you like reimaginings or understanding villains or you just feel like being taken to cool new worlds because this book deserves a lot of love. Kudos to all the authors and booktubers who made it possible <3<br/><br/><b>The Blood Of Imuriv</b><br/><spoiler>At the beginning of this story, I was mostly confused because I didn’t know who or what this was based on. But I just took it as its own thing and then I got into it. A very interesting fantasy world was created. A lot of emotions were had. It was really good!</spoiler><br/><br/><b>The Evil Vaccine: Keep The Darkness At Bay</b><br/>I love Christine and I’m really proud of her but I didn’t entirely love this one. It was cute and funny but if it was supposed to fit with Imuriv, it didn’t work too well.<br/><br/><b>Jack</b><br/>My favorite one! It was written perfectly. <spoiler>And the plot twists made me fall in love with it. I wouldn’t change a thing. It’s so dark and sad and shocking and I forgot exactly what they were, but the little mentions of TV and how stories usually play out were also fantastic. I don’t know what else to say. I just loved it.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Giants And Tyrants</b><br/>I enjoyed this one too. It’s a nice addition to Jack. It’s short, but I appreciate its depth.<br/><br/><b>Gwen And Art And Lance</b><br/><spoiler>I really like stories told through text messages. I have only read a couple but they’ve all been fun. Including this one. I’m not very emotionally attached to it because I never found myself rooting for one person more than the other, but it was still good. And it had references to ancient mythology so it gets an extra thumbs up for that.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>The Bad Girl Hall Of Fame</b><br/>Another additional I'm very thankful for. It’s relatively short but really fun.<br/><br/><b>Shirley and Jim</b><br/><spoiler>A genderbent version of Sherlock Holmes except Shirley, Jean, and Marty seem to be the only ones who are genderbent. It’s fine that Dennard wanted to change that a little to make it her own, but if you’re going to do that, why not just change them all? For example, Jim could’ve been a girl in this story and it still would have worked. It would have changed nothing so why not? There was no real need to keep him a <i>him</i> just so there could be a straight romance, just saying. The characters were interesting but I’m not a huge fan of Shirley. She was fine but the attempts to make her sound like a teenage girl mixed with the intellect we know Holmes to have didn’t mesh the way I wanted them to. I like the symbols and parallels in this story. White and black chess pieces. Warm and cold hands. They met somewhere in the middle when they kissed and it was honestly kind of poetic. It’s a nice story and commentary on life. The world is grayer than either of them wanted to believe. This was actually the first story I wrote a complete review for even though it’s the seventh one. What can I say? I like Sherlock Holmes.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Dear Sasha, The 411 For Villains</b><br/>Fun, clever, full of good advice ;)<br/><br/><b>The Blessing Of Little Wants</b><br/><spoiler>I liked the world Enni created filled with magic and politics and mystery but after reading this the first time, I had little to no clue what exactly happened at the end of this story. I knew Thomas wasn’t real. I figured that out halfway through. I knew Sigrid decided to kill her friend for power. But it felt like something was missing. Did she know Thomas wasn’t real? What did “killing him” even do? Maybe it’s because I was tired when I was reading this one, but at first, it felt like I needed more things explained. Or maybe that was the point? Maybe explaining it too much wouldn’t have made it better. I’m not really sure. It had me until the last two pages.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Will The Real Villain Please Stand Up?</b><br/><spoiler>I reread a little bit of The Blessing Of Little Wants after that confusion, and I think maybe Thomas represented the hero inside Sigrid, or maybe just the good part of her. And once that was gone, she could do whatever she wanted, learn everything, and take all that magic for herself. At least I think so. And I'm still unsure if there is one villain of this story but I enjoy that ambiguity.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>The Sea Witch</b><br/>Loved this one! Some of it was kind of predictable but I didn’t mind at all. It was fun to read and added a lot of depth to the sea witch.<br/><br/><b>Villain Or Hero? You Decide!</b><br/>Nice commentary and a cute quiz. Although, it’s incredibly simple and I wished for a third option for almost every question. I guess I’m not a complete hero or villain. I’m somewhere in the middle (more toward hero) and I think I prefer that.<br/><br/><b>Beautiful Venom</b><br/>Beautiful Venom brought attention to some very serious issues in our society. Wouldn’t change a thing about this one. Bravo!<br/><br/><b>Without The Evil In The World, How Do We See The Good?</b><br/>Halfway through reading this, I had to stop to look Ben up and subscribe to his YouTube channel. I agree with everything he wrote and he wrote very well.<br/><br/><b>Death Knell</b><br/>There is something so poetic and beautiful and awesome about this one. I just. love it. so much. My reaction after finishing this was basically “AAAAAAHHHH” so...I guess you could say this is my other favorite story. (I can have more than one.) Going through the beginning again after the end made it even better. I had to take note of a few of my favorite lines:<br/><spoiler>“He steps one foot down the hill, and the next in the field, one foot in the field, and the next in the forest, one foot in the forest, and the next at the edge of town. He takes another step, but his bare feet move forward a single stride, solid, ordinary. This is how Death knows he is close.”<br/>“She knows, and she is scared. A horrible heart-stammering-in-her-chest, run-run-run kind of scared. But her mother said there’s no outrunning Death or the devil, so she holds her ground and tells herself there’s more than one kind of quick in the world.”<br/>It's just. perfect in every way.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Dear Death</b><br/>I can’t find the words to explain this one. “Deep” isn’t enough. It’s very emotional, well crafted, and heartfelt. I loved every sentence.<br/><br/><b>Marigold</b><br/>I predicted the end of this story fairly quickly but that didn’t make my reading experience any worse. I loved the writing and the pacing and all the characters were interesting. <spoiler>I personally don’t think Isaac deserved to die as much as George. I hated George. I knew that pretty quickly. But Isaac was just sort of...uneducated, let’s say. He wasn’t completely innocent but it wasn’t entirely his fault.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Evil Revealed</b><br/>Regan took the words right out of my mouth. Marigold sheds light on very important issues with a magical twist and I’m glad this was the prompt Shannon got.<br/><br/><b>You, You, It’s All About You</b><br/><spoiler>Cool and disturbing and clever all at the same time. Twists I didn’t expect and an A+ concept. Bravo, Adam Silvera.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Behind The Villain’s Mask</b><br/>Some of this reads like something you’d find in a magazine quiz but I’m not really complaining. Never would have thought of half the symbolic things in this story if it weren’t for this commentary. It’s interesting and sad and gross to think about. A combination of the Joker and Harley Quinn was also a brilliant idea!<br/><br/><b>Julian Breaks Every Rule</b><br/><spoiler>What’s cool about this one is that it’s kind of supernatural but it’s never completely explained. Sure, I will accept that Julian is an angel of death. Why? I don’t know. But it made for an interesting story. And because it’s more open-ended, I can guess the rules of this strange world where Julian can get away with anything. It seems like he can only cause the deaths of strangers, people whose names he doesn’t know, people he makes up titles for. Which is why Stephen Kemple won’t die. And maybe Julian gets away with everything because he has to. Otherwise, he’d eventually get caught and somebody has to be the angel of death. I thought it was interesting how often full names were used in the narration and situations were almost over-explained but in an enjoyable way. It didn’t feel like too much. I really liked it. It seemed like how Julian would think which makes sense. First person stories are always fun, especially when they feel real. This felt real (OK, 'real' is a stretch because...angel of death) and I loved reading it. I knew something was going to happen at the end of the story and it didn’t completely blindside me, but it was shocking enough. And that part of me that roots for the bad guy just because they’re interesting and good at what they do was very impressed reading the last page. Also, good foreshadowing. And good sorta-breaking-the-fourth-wall-by-mentioning-foreshadowing.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Julian Powell: Teen Psycho Extraordinaire</b><br/><spoiler>“He never lies to you about what he’s done or what he’s thinking, which made him feel like a way more reliable narrator than you typically get with psychopaths. But it also begged the question of whether he was telling the truth, which caused me to have a bit of a crisis.”<br/>“Julian felt like a normal teenager.”<br/>“Julian’s inner voice remained very lighthearted throughout the story, which was a great contrast to his sinister thoughts and behavior.”<br/>“Strange, suspenseful, and definitely psychopathic, Julian Powell is a teen psycho extraordinaire.”<br/>Couldn’t have said it better myself!</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Indigo And Shade</b><br/><spoiler>I really don't like Brahm. He's entitled and pretentious and annoying. He's a good example of how there's a big difference between having confidence and being full of yourself. He's written very well if he was meant to be...awful. The ending was completely unexpected. I thought it would end with Indigo killing him as the Shade and it would be a scary lesson about girl power or something, but I think what happened was really cool! What's interesting is depending on what point of view you have in this story, Brahm can be the hero or the villain. I like how complicated that is.</spoiler><br/><br/><b>Glamorized Recovery: Expectation Vs. Reality</b><br/>I don't feel that bad for villains like Gaston because as interesting and strong as villains can be, most of them are weak in some way and that's what made them villains in the first place. It's this character flaw that ruined their image and made them the bad guy. It's fun to think about, but after a certain point, I realized that I can only accept so much and not every villain is going to have my sympathy. But anyway, I agree with the idea that heroes and villains are incredibly similar, they just represent two very different outcomes: failure and success. That was explained nicely in this.<br/><br/><b>Sera</b><br/>Creepy. Fascinating and I wish it was longer, but it's creepy. In a good way.<br/><br/><b>The Bad Girl's Guide To Villainy</b><br/>I will follow this advice...and I'll always remember - NO CAPES!"