If We Were Villains

If We Were Villains is a tour de force! I began reading Rio's novel on a long flight, and the hours flew--full to bursting with suspense, mystery, and the fever-pitch passions among a group of young theater students at a Fine Arts college. These aspiring actors not only study and perform Shakespeare's plays: they live and bleed them, on and off stage, immersing readers in their own world of ambition, lust, jealousy, vengeance, sacrifice, and, possibly, love. The first scene opens with the narrator jailed for the murder of a fellow thespian, and the plot thickens, inexorably, from there on… show more.

If We Were Villains centers around seven students enrolled in the elite Shakespeare program at Dellecher Classical Conservatory.

The fictional college is housed on the grounds of an old country estate in rural Illinois, and the novel unfolds in the autumn and winter. The way Rio weaves Shakespearean passages into the book to reflect what the students are experiencing at the time is flawless. But this book isn’t just for Shakespeare fans (though it helps a little if you don’t hate it); it provides enough twists and turns to make even the most sophisticated thriller reader’s head spin.

If Were Villains is an extraordinarily rare novel that I adore. Once I picked it up I couldn’t put it down. It follows seven students attending their senior year at Dellecher Classical Conservatory. Oliver Marks essentially lives in a bubble where he lives, breathes, eats, and sleeps nothing but Shakespeare. He and his friends dance a fine line between fiction and reality, often getting lost in the characters they play. As they get wrapped up in the world of Julius Caesar, bloody and mired in betrayal, fiction becomes reality when one of the seven dies. Oliver is left to… show more.