NF

First time reading Chuck Klosterman. Book is unlike any I've read. He tackles an interesting topic with unusual insights and crisp, entertaining yet analytical writing. Klosterman finds a wide array of villains to analyze -- from The Eagles to Joseph Stalin. If I one criticism of the book I suppose sometimes it's a little too erratic with a couple of chapters. I thought they could have stood alone as magazine essays but didn't really hand together with other parts of the book. Nothing that should keep you from reading this one. I strongly recommend. ( )

For reasons I probably don't have to articulate, I feel like I should not like Klosterman or this book. But I loved it, I love the subject, and I couldn't put it down. I am weak? ( )

Pretty funny book, but the last chapter is the clincher for why this is 5-stars. I won't ruin it for you. ( )

It's not about the kind of villains you're probably thinking of, except for the one token chapter about Hitler, but spends more time on the public figures decried widely in the 1980s and 1990s, a few from this century. Even though I lived through that time, it had the effect on me of thinking "oh yeah, I haven't thought about him in a long time" or misremembering the particulars of what made each particular one so vilified. It isn't so much about the motivations these people had but the reason why the public perception of the villain's worldview makes them so despised, more about mass psychology and less about criminal psychology. The author is also interested in why certain individuals who have performed similar acts as others are not treated as villains in the same way. It isn't really a how-to guide on avoiding being considered a bad person, or even on how to get yourself noticed as a bad person, but more a series of meditations on different aspects of the phenomenon. ( )