A woman like Esek Nightfoot, from 'These Burning Stars.' Powerful, obsessive, egotistical, and genuinely sociopathic. I love when women are terrible people but even moreso when they don't try to hide it at all.
I'd prefer it if she was a main character / has significant involvement in the story or the lives of our MCs. Any recommendations?
by DistinctCard3825
25 Comments
Gone GIrl
The Baru Cormorant books and The Locked Tomb series might be what you’re looking for. Tbh anything in the “Lesbian Space Atrocity” genre would be up your alley.
Yellow Face
East of Eden
One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest
Boy Parts by Eliza Clark, I read it years ago and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.
Great Expectations has Miss Havisham, an openly misanthropic old woman who is one of the most intriguing villains of classic literature. She was stood up at the altar in her youth and wishes to exact revenge on the male sex by grooming her adoptive daughter into a cruel and manipulative woman for the sole purpose of having her break mens’ hearts.
The last Mrs Parrish
Misery
Gone with the Wind
Tampa
Yoooo I loved this book so much. I got the ARC for the sequel from NetGalley and it was awesome too.
You’ll probably enjoy Monza Murcatto from Best Served Cold
Oh boy… read The Poppy War trilogy by RF Kuang for some female power / rage / egotism. It builds up over the series
The Guest by Emma Cline is one of my favs this year she’s a terrible person and somehow it gets worse from there
Vanity Fair
Cyteen , by CJ Cherryh
It’s a classic. Won the Hugo Award for best novel.
Cyteen is a distant colony of earth, and has seceded from earth, causing a long war.
Arriane Emory is not only the leading scientist on Cyteen, whose work on psychologically is used in the production of Azi (think clones) she’s also a capable and utterly ruthless politician.
Justin, a young clone of his father is one of her students. When his brother is threatened by arriane. He becomes entangled with her… she has a ‘thing’ for young vulnerable teenage boys… and his life becomes hellish…
The novel spans decades, and is a world class story of political intrigue in a police state, where every thing you say might be listened to… it claustrophobic, paranoid… it is brilliant.
Arriane is one of the greatest women characters of all time… brilliant, scary as hell… a genius…
I reread this pretty much once a year… it is been one of my top favourite books for the past 25 years…
Vladimir! By Julia May Jonas, she is obsessive and a little detestable but sooo fun to read! (edited because I was too excited and didn’t include anything other than the title in this comment lol)
My Year of Rest and Relaxation! Perfectly fits the prompt 😂
None of This is True by Lisa Jewell
Madame Bovary
When We Lost Our Heads by Heather O’Neil. Two women over the course of their friendship into adulthood. 1800’s Montreal. French Revolution parallels. I ate it up
Also – A Certain Hunger by Chelsea G Summers if you like horror
Stone Cold Fox by Rachel Koller Croft
The Guest by Emma Cline
Never Saw Me Comjng by Vera Kurian
The Kind Worth Killing by Peter Swanson
Fifty Fifty by Steve Cavanaugh
My Lovely Wife by Samantha Downing
I think these all might fit the brief (outside of some great suggestions mentioned already!)
All of Rachel Harrison’s books. I also really liked *The New Me* by Hallie Butler
Daisy Darker by Alice Feeney