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  • Published: 30 June 2026
  • ISBN: 9780241763926
  • Imprint: Michael Joseph
  • Format: Hardback
  • Pages: 400
  • RRP: $45.00
Categories:

Vile Lady Villains




A world-burning romance between literature's most famous Lady Villains, Lady Macbeth and Klytemnestra . . .

Lady Macbeth turns to the three witches for advice.
She’s given a brew that transports her to a strange realm.
Desperately lost, she opens a door to a woman drenched in blood.

Klytemnestra is exacting bloody vengeance on her husband.
Yet an otherworldly door appears and a strange woman steps in.

Thrown into unknown territory, the pair are forced to form an alliance or perish.
Yet the realm’s goddess, The Mistress of the House of Books, claims to hold the key to saving them. But can they trust her?

As every threat brings our vile lady villains closer into fiery attraction, they have a choice: remain within the confines of their original tales …
Or burn down the world to pen a new story together . . .

  • Published: 30 June 2026
  • ISBN: 9780241763926
  • Imprint: Michael Joseph
  • Format: Hardback
  • Pages: 400
  • RRP: $45.00
Categories:

About the author

Danai Christopoulou

Danai Christopoulou is a Greek author raised on a diet of myths and tragedies. Danai’s writing has appeared in Glamour, Marie Claire, khoréo, Fusion Fragment, Flame Tree Press, Writer's Digest and more, nominated for a Pushcart Prize and for a Best of Small Fictions, and featured on the Nebula and Stoker recommended reading lists. Vile Lady Villains is Danai's debut novel. Growing up amid the ancient ruins of Athens, Greece, Danai currently haunts a forest in Sweden.

Praise for Vile Lady Villains

Cathartic and deeply romantic, Vile Lady Villains is the iconic queen crossover of my dreams! Claret and Anassa’s empowering journey through harrowing trials, innovative dreamscapes, and murky choices builds like a fever breaking into a celebration of vicious women, second chances, and taking control of your story.

Leanne Schwartz, author of A Prayer for Vengeance and To a Darker Shore

Vile Lady Villains is a stunningly original novel, dense and dark and overwhelmingly magical. It's a daring blend of borrowed stories, recreating characters we thought we knew, and giving them the full, unfettered life they deserve. Lovers of Shakespeare and Greek myth will be enchanted

Louisa Morgan, The Faerie Morgana

In confident, luscious prose, Christopoulou creates an enthralling liminal quest, where two of literature's most infamous female villains reclaim their stories—and fall irrevocably in love. I was spellbound from the very first page and could hardly breathe as the ending neared. Heart-rending, atmospheric and unmissable.

Kika Hatzopoulou, Sunday Times bestselling author of Threads That Bind

Danai Christopoulou’s Vile Lady Villains is part classical theatre compressed into a jewel-box of metafiction, part living painting: its palette supersaturated with passion, poetry, and portent. Her familiar protagonists, Claret and Anassa, like two firebirds of blood and spirit, arise entwined from the wreckage of their own tragic narratives, pursued by fates, furies, and the chance at something better.

C. S. E. Cooney, World Fantasy Award-winning author of Saint Death’s Daughter

A rollicking ride through time and space, drawing together two women from very different worlds. With prose as sharp as a blade and as rich as blood, Christopoulou has created a deeply satisfying story.

Luna McNamara, author of Psyche & Eros

A richly intertextual narrative about writing your own story rather than the one that is written for you, Vile Lady Villains reimagines the powerful women of literature and myth. Christopoulou brings two iconic characters together for an adventure that will delight, inspire, and surprise. Teeming with queer tension and sparking with anger and joy in equal measure, this is a rare and exciting work of feminist literature.

Elyse John, author of Orphia and Eurydicius
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