Reviews

Not Your Villain by C.B. Lee

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kittycatlover24242's review

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adventurous emotional funny lighthearted mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.25

daumari's review

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5.0

Probably would rate this 4.5? I liked it better than Not Your Sidekick (think I got used to the present tense as well), probably because I got to see the characters I learned about grow and develop.

The first fifth or so of this book recaps Not Your Sidekick, but from Bells perspective, though we also get to see him go to Meta-Human Training at an undisclosed location in what was likely former British Columbia. I really appreciated this part of the world building given what we learned about how meta-humans are organized at the end of NYS, and was curious about the training bit (Christine's parents donating to put her in the program was unintentionally resonant with the news story about wealthy parents paying a fixer to pretend their students were athletes/etc. to get into elite schools, but that's a side tangent).

I am cis, so I don't know how well Bells' PoV speaks to the trans experience, but he gets a really great line about 2/3rds through the book where he tells an enemy that it doesn't matter if his shapeshifting is taken away, in his heart and his head he knows who he is. There's discussion of a character possibly being ace or aro, which feels like a great way to introduce concepts to a teenage audience.

Throwing this in my Idahome tag as well because at one point, characters walk from a shelter in Middleton to the Bitterroot hovertrain station, which I assume is likely in the Bitterroot mountain range...

klrnshelves's review against another edition

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adventurous funny lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

3.75

summer_winter's review

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3.0

This was rather disappointing as I enjoyed the first book so much. This book was just kinda boring and I didn't really care about the plot or the characters.

spacepanda120's review

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adventurous hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

hannahhmh's review

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2.0

The first third of this book is just the first book and it's not like it gives us any insight in Bells we didn't know before. Other than that, characters in this book just don't talk the way any real person would. And I'm not talking about announcing your own pronouns, I mean girls in high school flipping out because someone remembered their name. And then whispering in earshot of that guy about how cool he is. Of course, this was prevalent in the first book as well, but that book had a super cute romance to pull me in. This book had two best friends refusing to talk about their feelings to each other and tbh I wasn't feeling their romance.