Antonia Bernardin

Assistant to the villain by Hannah Nicole Maehrer was my 79th read of the year, this is another booktok favourite that I’ve seen on a tonne of lists and it looked like a fun listen to entertain me on my commute.

Plot summary attempt

Evie is desperate to support her sick father and little sister, so when she finds an injured man in the woods whose being hunted by royal guards, she realises she’s accidentally bumped into and helped, the infamous Villain. Typical Evie mishap… but she decides to shoot her shot anyway and make a joke about needing employment and then the villain takes her up on it!

This how Evie finds herself the Assistant to the Villain and in a world she strangely excels in. She has also helped the Villain reduce the number of times he plays ‘scatter games’ with the interns (where he randomly shoots at them while they run) and sneaks him a sugary coffee without anyone knowing as its very off brand for him to drink anything but a black coffee.

Except, someone is trying to sabotage the villain and messing up Evie’s projects. First shipments get interrupted, then there’s a bomb in her bosses office that nearly kills her. So the Villain recruits Evie to help him figure out who on staff is betraying him. He finds his strange, chaotic assistant growing on him and starts to enjoy her antics, even though if any other staff member talked as incessantly as she did, he would throw them (literally) out the window. As they investigate the traitor, the Villain starts to find how much Evie has become essential to him and the running of his office but can he trust her? And can he trust the emotions she’s waking up inside him?

My thoughts

This book is so much fun! It’s hilarious, Evie is weird and relatable, her internal monologue about how hot she finds her villain boss is just brilliant. It’s dual POV and I love how the villain thinks about her in his head, he’s just pure simping for her and then acting super grumpy to her face. But it’s not just a silly book, it actually has a pretty interesting plot, good characters and the characters have a nice journey arc.

I’ll definitely be continuing the series, if you like silly, fun, fantasy books, this is the perfect feel good break for your reads.