Scalzi Summary

Things we enjoyed about “Starter Villain”:

• Humour great
• The cats are awesome
• Cats brilliant part of the narrative
• Everything is ridiculous, that was great!
• “Really really enjoyed it”
• Just a fun book
• Easy to read, engaging, entertaining, quick to read
• Fast-paced, in media res, “couldn’t put it down”
• Good level of escalation
• Realistic ending, Scalzi managed to tie all the storylines together
• Over the top, very fun
• Audiobook read by Will Wheaton amazing
• Banter between Charlie and everybody else
• Dialogue great
• Slapstick comedy
• Playing with every single supervillain clichée
• funeral home scene “dumb” but “how is the funeral director this calm”
• Being spied on by cats, amazing
• Cats talking amazing
• Unionised dolphins on strike brilliant
• Execution of the nonsense was top notch
• All that nonsense: really hard to predict anything. Wild ride!!
• Bingo list book, most random things part of the story
• Book doesn’t take itself seriously; very meta; Scalzi embraces that he writes ridiculous things
• The cats were so in character
• Arrogant cats
• Dogs could not be supervillains
• Cats care for him –> reversed power dynamic; Charlie the pet and the cats are the owner; fitting cat behaviour “oh what a dumb human”
• Falls a bit short but then again, nice that it’s not super long
• “This is madness and I’m enjoying the madness”
• Criticism hard because it’s planned nonsense 😀
• no romance, yay
• Villain found family? Vs. being alone?
• Villainy + bureaucracy lol
• Mafia vibes
• Super villain convention, haha
• Inheriting money –> inhereting their villain status; nepo babies
• Absurdity of it was great
• Capitalism critique –> subscription based villainy
• Dolphins ❤
• Ending nice: down to earth?
• Charlie unfazed by a lot of things, interesting
• Spy whales?
• All the humans are being played by the cats & dolphins & whales?
• Sad about the dolphins: cannot go back to their fellow dolphins
• Oozes joy, you need to be in the right mood for it
• Writing style good, humours ton fits the topic
• Down to earth writing style
• Just made me laugh
• The cover with the cat is amazing!

Things we discussed:

• Charlie (protagonist) not very likeable, typical John Scalzi main character though
• Annoying protagonist, bit naive (others liked him!)
• Beginning somewhat confusing
• Exposition took a little too long, pacing off
• “Also I had expected more cats to be honest”
• Ex-wife / family parts meh, also no reconnection with the siblings
• Charlie gullible and should’ve been a bit more down to earth
• Charlie a bit sexist? And why behave in that way? Also tons of self-pity? But then again he has some backbone and wants to do the right thing? Flawed character interesting
• Stock character: male character to whom the adventure just happens; emotional range missing
• What is going on with the spoons? Is there a backstory? 😀
• More female representation would’ve been nice
• More character would’ve been nice? Charlie the only in-depth character + randos he meets
• Charlie flawed and annoying: funny
• Can Charlie really be a barkeep and own a bar? Unclear
• More talking animals?
• More unions for dolphins!!!

Weird ratings of the book:

• 3.75/5 unionised dolphins ❤ (slightly different expectations)
• unfinished: 4/5 spy cats
• 5/5 lairs
• 4/5 unfazed funeral directors
• 4/5 dramatic explosions

Great books to read:

• Kaiju Preservation Society by Scalzi also great
• Ocean’s Godori –> we’ll read it with BSFG but it is great
• We are Legion (we are Bob) by Dennis E. Taylor (audiobook is great)