Welcome to my Villain Era.

Or, I had an idea and did a thing.

Things have been rough—for me, and for everyone. I’ve been hiding out from living life so far in 2025. My guide word for the year is “gentle,” as a reminder to be gentle with myself and others as we proceed through another sweep of “unprecedented times.” It’s…exhausting.

I’m trying to get out of this rut I find myself in, and one of the most successful ways so far has been Villain Era. Nothing else has held my attention this effectively since 2025 began.

I love the phrase “villain era.” Though I’m sure she didn’t coin it, I’ll always associate it with RuPaul’s Drag Race Season 15 icon Mistress Isabelle Brooks, who had more eras than a Taylor Swift tour. But I like the idea that we can dip our toes into villainy. That it can have a start and end date. That, for whatever life throws at us, we can always establish an era to help us fight back.

I’ve also always loved revenge. As a concept, as a plot device, as a form of justice. (All revenge is justice, but not all justice is revenge.) My Scorpio Moon has entered the chat, and there’s a lot for us to talk about.

My friend Jaime was talking to me at work—this was almost 20 years ago and dear god why did I just let myself do that math. We were talking about acting and directing in theater. She said, basically, that no character is evil. Evil does not exist. Every action has a motivation, and the impact of that action is good or evil in the eyes of the recipient (or victim?). And I’ve never stopped thinking about that.

I also think a lot about when my friend and Splice of Life editor Adam al-Sirgany and I were going over edits for the book. One of the chapters ends with the sentence, “I was the villain of this story.” (And I was.) Adam looked up at me and said, “Actually, Charlie, you’re the villain in a lot of these stories.” And I was.

He was right. Maybe we’re at our most interesting when we’re most villainous. Villainy is often rooted in self-interest, but the best villains are the ones trying to do the right thing in the wrong way—Poison Ivy, for instance, wanting to stop humankind’s impact on the environment (good) by murdering polluters (not good). Or Mr. Freeze, just to keep it in the Batman universe for a minute, trying to create a world where his wife can live again (aw, so sweet) by causing a global ice age (eh, pass).

I decided to toss these ideas into a shoestring literary magazine focused on “literature of revenge.” Whatever that means to writers and readers.

And you know what? I feel like I have something exciting in my life again. Holding my focus. Here are the submission guidelines from the website:

Villain Era celebrates the petty vendetta, the enduring grudge, the annoying inconvenience. Who hurt you? Tell us. On the other hand, tell us about when you were someone else's villain.

While we love a good revenge story, Villain Era is not an outlet for racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, xenophobia, ableism, or any other sick thinking you want to direct to a group of people, especially a marginalized group.

Villain Era is agnostic of form and tradition, but while we love form and tradition, we also really love innovation and discovery. Send us your weird little angry poems and your snotty sonnets. We'll also take your fiction, if you have it. The shorter the better. But good is good.

When you have a score to settle and you want to enter the octagon verse first, that's when you should think of us.

Unpublished work only. Simultaneous submissions encouraged. Send 3-5 poems of any style, no longer than 10 pages total. Fiction or nonfiction up to 6,000 words. (If it's longer or weirder than a word count, send it anyway and let us know in the email what's going on.) Email as a Word doc or RTF to villaineralit at gmail dotcom. Put your full name and "Submission" in the subject line. Be kind——don't use wacky fonts or anything beyond the 10-12 point range.

All work should be representative of your villain era(s).

Let justice prevail.

I used to not do things because I worried about not doing them perfectly, or not being able to do them forever. But with Villain Era, I’m open to being liminal. If it exists for a year or a decade, it’ll have meant something to me. It’s lifting me up. And I hope that it lifts up the writers whose work appears on the site.

Villain Era reminded me that when I’m at my lowest, the best way to pick myself back up is to lend a hand to others. So hopefully that’s what it does. Stay tuned!

And may you all embrace your own villain era(s), when you need to.