Hench / Villain
[2026-05-21_hench-villain]

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#lit #review

§ Hench (2020) ^

4/5

I've been a fan of Hench by Natalie Zina Walschots since before it even came out. Not because I know the author --- I don't --- but because I won a Goodreads giveaway for an ARC. Here's the brief review I wrote back in 2020:

First time I think I've actually read an ARC cover to cover. I was pleasantly surprised to find it was borderline an anarchist/antifascist wish-fulfilment fantasy, with supers standing in for police/fash/the powerful. Our plucky temp-worker protagonist marshals the forces of statistics, utilitarianism, and doxing to wage war on the establishment.

There are some weaknesses with the prose (one odd thing I noticed is, for the first few chapters, people are always nearly choking with laughter) and the plot has some issues. It's rough around the edges, and I don't know if that's due to it being an ARC or being a debut. But I still found it very compelling in spite of that. By the end, I was cackling and could not put it down. It's just great. One nice bonus is that this book seems to understand bisexuality, and the protagonist is bi. That's more common lately, but still rare enough to stand out to me.

Highly recommended as a fun weekend read for all mischievious/subversive nerds.

I spent six years cautiously hopeful that a sequel would be released, and... it was! It's called Villain and came out only a few days ago; I read it immediately.

But first, I had to re-read Hench. As you'll see from my review, I first experienced it unreservedly as a lighthearted romp. I was totally on board with what they did to the superheroes; I cheered it on. There was certainly an element of falling to the dark side --- I mean, she works for a supervillain, who is at best the equivalent of an evil corporation, and she becomes increasingly willing to get her hands dirty --- but I engaged with those elements more like hazards associated with fighting an essentially righteous war than signs of moral depravity, sort of like if Flame & Citron was about superheroes. (And good.)

A Goodreads friend, Nataliya, had a very different interpretation of the book. She saw it as a horror story about a deeply evil person whose actions are wholly inexcusable, their justifications only thin rationalizations. This gave me pause: am I a much worse person than I thought? I chalked up the disparity to politics: "I'm an anarchist, Nataliya's a lib." But it still stuck in the back of my mind. It's not exactly a far-fetched theory that I take the positions I do because I'm an evil person with a vast capacity for rationalization; I know hatred of my enemies sometimes goes too far.

There is plenty in the story to support her reading of it, after all. And there's no denying that internet warfare is about deriving pleasure from petty cruelty, which doesn't exactly fit the psychological profile of a good person. So I re-read Hench with an eye toward her interpretation of it as less a gleeful story than a tragic one, paying close attention to Anna's epistemic blind spots and the unethical things she does.

And yeah, she does shitty stuff. She endangers her friends and harms her allies. She assassinates someone who by her own admission isn't doing much harm, just because the numbers work... and because it will help her plan to destroy her nemesis. She doesn't seem to account for any misery that isn't measurable in life-years or bother to include her caped enemies in her moral calculus.

But I mean, it is a story about becoming a supervillain. I don't think it's really supposed to be taken that seriously. Also, fuck the police.

What stood out to me was not her descent into evil, it was her descent into love --- an equally powerful and destructive force. Leviathan, her employer/love interest, is her biggest epistemic blind spot of all. She doesn't run a calculus on his continued existence in the world. We don't learn much about his evil deeds --- she doesn't really seem interested in finding out herself --- but they probably include plenty of murders; he is the most infamous supervillain in the world, after all.

I'm a bit of a sucker for toxic romance. (For another exemplar, try Gideon the Ninth.) They're in love because they admire each other's power and ability to be an asshole (relatable!). This is not a very healthy kink. Also, uh... Leviathan is literally a demonic-looking bug-man. Like Predator or something. He's creepy as fuck.

So, after my re-read, what I most wanted from Villain was doomed love and horrifying, chitinous makeouts. Being seduced by evil, figurative: boring. Being seduced by evil, literal: amazing.

§ Villain (2026) ^

3/5

Did I ever get my wish! The entire book is about their relationship, for better and worse. It really digs into the harmful power dynamics at play. It turns out, when you date an all-powerful control freak supervillain, he's super abusive! So note that down as a red flag. If a guy talks about himself in the third person, swipe left.¹

As a result, it's a lot less fun than the first book. It's much bleaker, sadder; more like the horror Nataliya saw in the first book. Instead of cheering on Anna's self-destructive impulses I'm more like "oh, honey..." It makes it a lot harder to kick back and enjoy a toxic relationship when it's depicted realistically, with all the panic attacks and dissociation and whatnot.

Still, it's compelling. I didn't get a bunch of horrible chitinous makeouts, but I got something even better: a sex scene! It's unexpectedly... really hot?

The surfaces of him were hard but not uncomfortable, warm with unexpected give. We had to find the ways in which we fit together, a question unlocking an answer and another question, like a braid or links in a chain. I came for the first time against his thigh, grinding against a plate shaped like a tasset, while he bit down on my shoulder with his chelicerae, drawing pinpricks of blood in a starburst. Later, draped over his back, I tried to brush one of his antennae gently, and he wrapped his fingers around mine to make me squeeze harder.

"Pull," he whispered, and then whined when I did, arching under me.

"You'll have to show me all the places I can hurt you," I said, and pulled harder.

That part made me kick my feet and make an undignified noise. Tragically it doesn't go on for very long, but their weird chemistry does. He's always nibbling her hand with his horrible insect mouth while they plot their dastardly schemes together, and after they fuck she has to bandage up all her injuries. It's so romantic! If only he weren't such a piece of shit.

(Tangential: we know Leviathan walks around naked or nearly naked. Does he have genitals? A prehensile retractable penis, perhaps? It sounds to me like he doesn't, and for some reason I really like that, like it's extra queer.)

The other parts of the story didn't really grab me. There's no exciting war storyline with a big triumphant finish like in the first book. The various torments they rain on the supers feel a bit aimless. It feels more like a PR war between corporations than the complex data-driven internet warfare from Hench, and their cruelties are less giggle-inducing and more just a bummer.

My favorite character, Decoherence, pops up occasionally but doesn't feel like she gets enough screen time. She's basically Leviathan's inverse --- just as powerful, just as attractive to Anna, but has a conscience and lives in a ratty apartment with zero minions. I wish they would have like, kissed, or at least briefly talked about their feelings; it's unclear to what extent she returns Anna's feelings and to what extent she's just trying to be there for an abused friend, though it's strongly implied it's the former. I suspect the third book will make their love explicit and Anna will murder her; Leviathan calls her Anna's nemesis which seems prophetic.

That's all I got. I'm looking forward to the next one... in 2032.² "Supervillain"? "Hero"? "Kick"?

§ See Also ^