The Evil that Men Do – My Deadly Valentine Back to Blog
Update: The winner of INVITATION TO RUIN is…Larena! Congrats!
Happy Friday, everyone! Hope you are looking forward to a wonderful weekend. đ Today, I’ve got another one of my very talented Brava author sisters with me. It’s my pleasure to introduce Bronwen Evans to you–Bronwen writes sexy and dark regency romances, and you’ll be able to purchase her upcoming release, INVITATION TO RUIN, on February 22! Welcome, Bronwen!
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Hello from New Zealand!
When Cynthia kindly invited me to blog with her, using the premise of My Deadly Valentine, I was thrilled. I love a good villain.
I write Regency historicals, and while the genre is different from a dark romantic suspense, I always have a disturbing villain in my books. There is just something so engaging about a villain. Take Eric Northman in True Blood, a villain you love to hate, or is it simply lust to hate.  Or the villain you canât wait to see get their comeuppance, like the White Witch in the Narnia series.
I started thinking about how, as a writer, I come up with villains and how I get into their heads. I asked my friend and critique partner, Gracie OâNeil (www.romanceshewrote.com) who writes romantic suspense, for help. And she prepared some villainous questions for me to answer.
1. In your opinion, what makes a terrifying villain?
Intelligence. A villain whoâs intelligent is a most dangerous beast. In my debut book, Invitation to Ruin, due for release on 1 March 2011, the villain is so clever that no one would believe the evil he has planned. He doesnât do the obvious. Heâs unpredictable. That is what I find terrify. A villain you canât understand or anticipate.
2. When youâre creating your villain, do you start from the premise that most people are basically good, or from another hypothesis? How does you premise help you in his construction?
My premise always drives the type of villain I write. For instance, in Invitation to Ruin, the heroâs father was a slave trader. Therefore, it seemed obvious to have a villain who came from that environment. Once the idea was there, I simply thought about what sort of characteristics a villain who dealt in trading human beings would have. I developed his family background. What would his childhood have been like to have set him down this path, and why could Anthony (my hero) rise above it, but Philip (the villain) not? The good and bad within a person is often a trait of their upbringing, but something inside gives them the courage to overcome. Once Iâd drafted out Philipâs background, I knew how evil he would be.
3. What aspect of âbeing evilâ offends you most in a villain?
A complete lack of humanity. A person who picks on people unable to protect themselves. Â I hate cruelty of any kind. I was totally unsympathetic to Philip because he was a psychopath. He enjoyed otherâs pain, and lived to hurt and destroy.
4. Do you ever feel sorry for your villains?
I think itâs only human to feel sorry for them when the end comes, especially if theyâve had a terrible upbringing. Thatâs why I wanted Anthony and Phillip to have had the same horrendous childhood.  They both had sadistic fathers. It really demonstrated how Anthony was inherently good. His heart still had the capacity to love, while Phillip didnât even try to be good. Phillip chose the easy path and embraced evil.
5. How important is it for a villain to have at least one heroic quality?
That depends on the story. In Invitation to Ruin, I couldnât find anything redeeming in Phillip, so I didnât even try to give him any heroic qualities. Itâs not very heroic to trade in human flesh.
6. What is one personality trait you would NEVER give your villain?
I donât think Iâd ever say never. A premise, character background and a storyâs plot usually dictate the villainâs personality; so Iâd never say I wouldnât give him or her â ooooh , donât you find female villains scarier â I think Iâll put one in my next book â a certain trait.
I think villainâs are some of the most enjoyable characterâs to write and read. Donât you?
To win a copy of Invitation to Ruin, leave a comment below, telling me your favourite villain and why?
Thanks for having me, Cynthia. I canât wait to find the villain in DEADLY HEAT.
To find out more about my upcoming release, Invitation to Ruin, (RT Book Review 4.5 Star rating) and me, please visit my website www.bronwenevans.com or my blog Regency Seductions
Happy reading everyone
Bron
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Hello Bronwen!
One of my all-time favorite villians would be Keyser Soze in the movie The Usual Suspects. He isn’t just a villian he is almost like an evil presence that haunts the movie. We never really see him we only hear about how dangerous he is. He is a myth and a monster. He scared the hell out of me.
I love historicals. Congratulations on Invitation to Run!
Hi, Bronwen! Thanks for blogging with me! And congrats on your upcoming release. đ
Hi, Bronwen-
Happy Valentine’s Day.
My favorite villain is Spike from Buffy the vampire Slayer. Between the writing and the acting, the character was truly evil and eventually became a good guy. Yes, I like my evil villains either dead by the hero/ine’s hand or eventually becoming good.
I can’t think of a favorite book villain, it would have to be a character who isn’t killed off immediately, but would reoccur because like you mentioned, the villain should be smart and he/she wouldn’t get killed off/arrested right away.
Oh, how about (rats, another non-book villain) Morty/Muerte from the movie Undercover Blues? He was so funny and likeable because he was such a failure.
Congrats on your release! Lots of good wishes for big sales.
I second the Spike love. He was a great villain because of his passion and it was that passion that allowed him to be redeemed. Thanks for a great blog post.
My favorite villain so far is the doctor in Cheyenne McCray’s NO WEREWOLVES ALLOWED. That man was just plain wicked and sick.
Hi Brownen,
This is a hard one because villains aren’t what I would count as a favorite, lol. So lets see only one I can think of is a villianess Deirdre from the Dark Swords series by Donna Grant. She is just pure evil.
Thanks for stopping by and telling us about your new release INVITATION TO RUIN, it’s been added to my TBR đ
One of my favorite villains is Vadim Maur from C.L. Wilson’s Tairen series. Maur cared only for power and would destroy and use anything and everything in his path to achieve that – murder, rape, torture – whatever was required.
I like villains cruel, sadistic, inhuman and unredeemable because when their destroyed I do not want to feel any ambiguity in their destruction. I want to cheer and feel that good has at last conquered evil.
Hi,
Great post.
And I am totally at a lost as to who my favourite villain is. I think I’m having a senile moment…sigh!!!!
Valerie
in Germany
Wow… fav villian!?! Hmmm… I am not sure what my answer is. I love a villian that we the reader are unable to figure out till the end… I love a villian that does every little dirty trick to cause chaos for the hero and heroine… I love a viilian that seems like a friend of the character, but truly is behing all of the bad deeds…etc. I do not think I have a simple fav!
Hi everyone
There are some great villains mention. I see Angela has picked a female villain â arenât they creepy. I sometimes think they are worse than male villains. One of my favorite â love to hate villains – at the moment would be Elenaâs double ganger vampire bxxxh, Katherine, from The Vampire Diaries.
Hanibal Lector – he is not my usual villain, he is evil and twisted. But he was also clever and intelligent. There was something about the book (and movie) that I just couldn’t put down or not watch. I remember reading a chapter or two, saying I was going done, then picking it back up and reading more. I had to take him in small doses – his sort gives me nightmares!
StaciDM – I loved the Usual Suspects – it was such a clever movie, I didn’t figure it out til the end.
I can’t think of a single one right now even though I know there have been many.
Hi Bronwen and Cynthia! I love a good villain…the more evil he is, the tougher the hero has to be to win. I think Timothy Olyphant was an awesome villain in the last Die Hard movie, though he’s also an excellent dark hero in Justified. đ
Hi Bronwen, great interview!
I think Nassor from IMMORTAL DANGER was a pretty evil villian. Was a great moment when he was destroyed đ
Thanks for stopping by, looking forward to grabbing my copy of INVITATION TO RUIN in couple weeks đ
Congrats on the upcoming release, Bronwen. One of my favorite villains is Magneto from the X-Men comics. I like that he’s a villain to some and a leader and protector to others.
Congrats on the release, Bronwen. I like a villian who has the potential to be redeemed, so I’d also go with Spike. Though Hannibal Lecter, in his so evil, twisted ways, playing those mind games is an intriguing villain.
Congratulations on your new book! Villians can be very entertaining like all the villians in the Batman and Superman movies. Hanibal Lector was a really scary villian and then there’s Dexter who is both hero and villian in his series.
Thanks everyone
I like the concept of a redeemable villain. I sort of have a secondary villain/victim in my second book, Invitation to Scandal, who is a sympathetic villain. So much so that he appears in book three, and in the end does the right thing.
Spike certainly fits the picture of a redeemable villain, as does Eric Northman in True Blood.
I love it when their motivation to be bad is sympathetically handled.
okay my favorite villian is: Hannibal Lector. You cannot beat that guys. LOL
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