Starter Villain

By: John Scalzi

Narrated by: Wil Wheaton

Inheriting your uncle's supervillain business is more complicated than you might think. Particularly when you discover who's running the place.

Charlie's life is going nowhere fast. A divorced substitute teacher living with his cat in a house his siblings want to sell, all he wants is to open a pub downtown, if only the bank will approve his loan.

Then his long-lost uncle Jake dies and leaves his supervillain business (complete with island volcano lair) to Charlie.

But becoming a supervillain isn't all giant laser death rays and lava pits. Jake had enemies, and now they're coming after Charlie. His uncle might have been a stand-up, old-fashioned kind of villain, but these are the real thing: rich, soulless predators backed by multinational corporations and venture capital.

It's up to Charlie to win the war his uncle started against a league of supervillains. But with unionized dolphins, hyperintelligent talking spy cats, and a terrifying henchperson at his side, going bad is starting to look pretty good.

In a dog-eat-dog world...be a cat.

©2023 John Scalzi (P)2023 Audible, Inc.

Volcanic Lairs, Death Rays & Cats… Oh My! 😼

Confession time… I am an unrepentant John Scalzi/Wil Wheaton fanboy (heck, I’m such a fanboy that I obediently bought the video game that Scalzi mentions in passing at the end of the book). That particular duo is almost single-handedly, responsible for my audiobook addiction. As such, this review may be somewhat biased. With that said, and those expectations established, I am pretty sure that anybody looking at this review is already of the same mindset and simply wants to know “So how does Starter Villain stack up against John Scalzi’s other works?” This is quite simply one of his funniest books to date, but it’s also laced with his typical insightful social commentary. It’s not the deepest of his stories, but Starter Villain is a perfect follow up to Kaiju Preservation Society. If you enjoyed the humor there, you will certainly enjoy a double dose of it here (after all, how can you not love vulgar union-organizing dolphins).
Although I tend to avoid talking about plot points in reviews (that’s what the synopsis is for after all), I can say that this Scalzi outing is far more of a lark rather than some of the deep, operatic sci-fi epic he is known for. Essentially lampooning the larger than life egos of real life billionaire CEOs (I’m looking at you Elon Musk) and their corporate greed. This book clearly reminds you that the global corporations of this world are truly supervillains in their own right.
Some reviewers may be tempted to compare the absurdity of this book to the work of Douglas Adams or even Lewis Carroll, but I think that is an unfair comparison. The absurdity here is usually to set up a great joke or in the furtherance of a good societal commentary, yet at the heart of this story is still a cute emotional core. My only complaint about the book is simply that it is so quickly consumed and leaves you wanting more (with little hope of a sequel 😿). So who is this book good for…? Obviously any John Scalzi fans but more importantly, if you have ever suspected that your life is ruled by your cat… THIS BOOK IS FOR YOU!!! 😹

Light on story but OK

Story wise it is a little lacking… I don’t really care about what happens to the protagonist…

But the Scalzi dialog and the performance are as awesome as ever…

So… if you are new to this author… read something else by him… if you have read most of his stuff and would like another fix… go for it!

Meh burger

Nothing really new here. Honestly this is done better by many many other iterations on similar books.

It’s well written, but nothing really spectacular. Only real attraction might be if you love cats.

Great! no matter if cats matter to you.

Initially, there were some starts/reframes that are painful for the audiobook world- I put all fault on the producers. (Don't do an immediate change of scene without at least a significant pause! -- not a fault of the writer or performer!)

A very enjoyable book. Kind of liked it was wrapped up in this- don't have a cliffhanger. Love the universe it puts forth.

I have enjoyed most of John Scalzi's books. I have read almost all of his catalog. So far, this is the most fun, most enjoyable, and most suprising climax.

Kitties are not exactly central, or necessary to the plot, but well appreciated.

Pleasantly Surprised!

I am not a big fan of Wil Wheaton's rapid fire delivery nor have I read anything by Jon Scalzi, but I purchased this book on principle alone based on the hilarious book cover. Needless to say I was not disappointed. After I slowed the narration down to 85, I found I THOROUGHLY enjoyed Mr Scalzi's story as well as Mr. Wheaton's expressive story telling. Bravo, gentlemen!

I'll be looking for my next read from Mr. Scalzi... now.