Wicked, evil, naughty...bring it on

I'm a villian-lover from way back. They were always my favorite characters in books and movies, and were my favorite to play when I was an actor. My first leading role in a drama was as Rhoda Penmark, the little girl in "The Bad Seed", a play from the 1950's that explored the possibility of evil being a genetic trait. I was nine years old and had a BLAST playing a murdering little sociopath who managed to wrap everyone around her finger with her sweetness while killing off her classmates at the same time. After the play was over, my sweet father told me he wanted to turn me over his knee, which he hadn't done since I was four or five. I knew then that I had succeeded in being a really good villian.



Which brings me to the point of this post. I have a point, you ask? I know...shocking right :). For a villian to be one that really gets under my skin and provides all the proper loathing enjoyment that a good villian should, he or she has got to be wicked with reasons. I want to see that spark of humanity that shows they weren't always so awful. I want to see their hopes and dreams and feelings beyond world domination.

The evil overlord is only amusing on Saturday morning cartoons. If I don't feel the villian as a three-dimensional person, then the entire story will be flawed. This is a reason I have a hard time with villian POV in novels. They're always almost...too evil, which doesn't enrich the experience. But if done well, it can be chilling and wonderful (MJ Rose's "Halo Effect" has a great villian POV, you really feel how the psycho wants to save the women he's murdering.)



I love villians so much that I did a whole series on the wicked women from popular fairytales. The Perfectly Wicked series (book one, "Main Attraction", now available at Ellora's Cave) tells the alternate sexy stories of the bad girls everyone has loved to hate. Thus far, I've done the stepmother from Cinderella, the wicked queen from Snow White, the witch from Hansel and Gretel, and the dark fairy from Sleeping Beauty, and had such fun with each novella.

So much fun, I recently tried to convince my CP/WP, December Quinn, that we should write the story of the wicked woman villian from our urban fantasy menage, "Demon's Triad" (coming January 200). But she was judged too wicked for a redemption story...but still...I wonder....being a villian lover...is there any such thing as too wicked? ;)

Happy Wednesday,

Anna J. Evans

http://annajevans.com