Are there any books where the villain wins?

I don't mean stories where the villain gets defeated, but the hero dies, or something of that sort. I'm talking about an utter conquest, Sauron-gets-the-Ring type of ending.

It probably isn't a very common literary trope, if it even exists at all, but I was curious if anyone here knows of any stories like that. I've been wondering about it for a while.

Edit: Everyone has such great suggestions! And I have read almost none of these. To the book store, awayyyy!

August 8th, 2012

11:38 pm - Novels where the villains win!
I did "movies where the villains win" a while back. This time, it's novels.

Rule #1: No short stories. The purpose of the short story, as a genre, is to let the villains win in a setting that requires minimal reader involvement: Get the reader invested enough to kick them in the gut, then kick them. Fuck 'em, they try too hard. No short stories, NOVELS.

Rule #2: Bonus points are offered for anything longer than a Novella.

Rule #3: Most old novels are all basically novellas, which is kind of sad. So they count for less.

That being said: Novels where the villains win, outright.

First, the obvious, the barely-beyond-novella classics of "shit is fucked up and wrong":
1984, Animal Farm, Brave New World, The Time Machine.

Second, the more modern:
Orson Scott Card's "Ender's Game" - even if you take Card's interpretation that Ender isn't the villain, the bad guys win everything they wanted. Given that Ender really *is* the villain, nobody wins that one.
Charlie Stross, "The Merchant Princes" - a deconstruction of the standard "real-world princess discovers fantasy land where she brings civiilisation to the savages" trope, shit goes horribly wrong. The phrase "President Ashcroft" is involved.
"Red Dwarf" - no, really, if you can read the end of this without shuddering, something is wrong.
EDIT: Bret Easton Ellis, "American Psycho"
Chuck Palahniuk, "Fight Club".

Third, the fakeouts, where the "villain" who wins is actually the hero all along:
I Am Legend.
EDIT: Atlas Shrugged.

What am I missing? What are the other novels where the villains win?

(92 comments | Leave a comment)

Make Room! Make Room! by Harry Harrison. It's an old (and rather short) one, and the bad guys tend to be abstract forces of societal degeneration and unthinking cruelty, and they're very impersonal, but I think it counts.

Stand On Zanzibar by John Brunner. I'll just go over here and cry now.

Days by James Lovegrove, almost--the bad guys win, I think, but the protagonists get out from under. So.

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The villains in Days are archetypes, occupying mythic roles. They can't NOT act the way they do, and they're also not characters so much as they are placeholders for gods.

They're not villains, per se, any more than forces of nature or Greek gods are villains.

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(no subject) - torrain - Expand

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Guillermo del Toro/Chuck Hogan, "The Strain" trilogy -- not only do the villains kick everyone's asses for the majority of the three books, the only way to "win" against them is for the hero to self-destruct by setting off a nuke in a world which is already in a nuclear winter. The chief villain finally dies, but the world is fu-u-u-u-ucked.

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Stephen King's "Tommyknockers", IIRC, ends on a downbeat note. However, since it is a full-length King book, it kind of means that around halfway thru you've stopped giving shit about people and just want to reach the end so you don't need to read it ever again... (I like his short stories and rigorously edited novels better; his grand vision stays together better) Hmm. I s'pose "Cujo" counts too; sure, you may have killed the rabid dog, but you also lost the kid, even if the "bad guy" is more like destructive force of nature that wants nothing beyond perpetuating rabies.

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In Tommyknockers, Gard the only person immune to Tommyknocker control launches most of them into space and kills off all the rest. He dies, but the Tommyknockers lose. Cujo: a child dies but so does the dog?

But I'll give you Salem's Lot, for King.

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Depending on your definition of villain, The Genocides by Disch.

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Never read it. Summary/link to summary?

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(no subject) - nancylebov - Expand

"Villains By Neccessity" by Eve Forward. Epic fantasy world where Good Has Triumphed. Unfortunately it means sunshine and flowers and eternal spring, so the druids are out to bring back evil before nature is completely knocked for a loop. Main character is a thief freaked out that all his fellow thieves have gotten brainwashed and taken up basket weaving. Kinda deliberate, though, and the bad guys are the good guys, so the people you're rooting for still win.

Much of Lovecraft's work probably counts too, as the narrator is dying and scribbling their surprisingly lengthy final words, getting dragged off in a metal canister, or joining the Deep Ones.

Greg Bear's "Forge of God" -- Earth is destroyed, some humans escape to Mars, but generally the aliens pretty well kicked our ass.

Edited at 2012-08-09 04:19 am (UTC)

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Thought about Lovecraft, but in The Mountains of Madness I wouldn't say the bad guys win, and he mostly did short stories...

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Grunts! ?

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Peter Watts: Blindsight.

Depending how far back you're willing to go, and what formats are permissible, any of the versions of Faust. (Does Goethe's epic poem count? Does the script of Marlowe's play?)

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I always considered the Greeks to be the villains of the Trojan War (but perhaps I'm biased, as my name is Cassandra rather than Clytemnestra). They are winning by the end of the Illiad, and go on to win the war and throw babes from the city walls and rape women in temples.

Whether or not an epic poem counts, whether Mycenaeans are considered to be bad guys, and whether they can be said to have officially won by the end of the Illiad (which ends not with the actual end of the war, but with the return of Hector's body), is all up for question.

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(no subject) - catsidhe - Expand

For nastiest Bad Guy Wins, I'd say Joe Abercrombie's first trilogy "First Law". "Judgement of Kings" was fuck tons depressing...

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Seconded. Excellent writer but the ending pissed me off enough to throw the book across the room.

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(no subject) - ice_hesitant - Expand

Also if you allow books where the "hero" is a crook then lots of noir and pulp books probably. Starting with Richard Stark/Donald Westlake's "Parker" series...

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I don't think that the protagonist breaking the law is enough to have them inherently qualify as being the bad guy of the narrative.

I mean, The Talented Mr. Ripley totally counts. But even if it were novel-length, The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar does not, not even with the protagonist being a thief.

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Hmh. Does graphic novel count as novel?

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Oh! "Haunting of Hill House!"

And arguably "We Have Always Lived In The Castle," as you find out that one of the protags was indeed the murderer all along, and the other one knew it.

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I second both.

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Twilight.

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I don't think he means the reader invariably loses.

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That may be a reference to Jingo, where Vimes at the end is carrying a Disorganiser from an alternate trouser-leg of time, and gets to hear what would have happened if he had made a certain decision differently.

("Ovatyl orrc! Guvatf gb qb gbqnl: Qvr.")

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A Night in the Lonesome October, Roger Zelazny

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That's arguable.

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I'd say both of the K. J. Parker novels I've read - Folding Knife is definitely a "hero loses" novel, and The Company is at the very least a "no one wins" ending.

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Who is the best book villain?

Who is the best written villain in fiction?

Can the main character be a villain?

What are villains called in books?