120: Eblis – Writing Convincing Villains (Without Loving Them Too Much)

This week, we dove into the eternal struggle of writing good villains: pure evil forces vs. sympathetic antiheroes, Darth Vader vs. Sauron, and why Nabokov’s Lolita is a masterclass in manipulation (of you, dear reader). We talked about finding that tiny spark of humanity in awful characters but stopping before you accidentally make them too likable.Then we read first‑draft stories for Eblis, a name straight out of Islamic myth, perfect for tales of angels, devils, and moral messiness.Like this weeks episode and wish you could read as well as listen? Subscribe to our Substack for a summary of our opening discussion, a story from the episode, and a writing prompt!  Be sure to follow us on Instagram (if that's your sort of thing). Please do send us an email with your story if you write along, which we hope you will do. Episodes of Radio FreeWrite are protected by a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-ND 4.0) license. All Stories remain the property of their respective authors.