History YMMV / LincolnRhyme

* AcceptableTargets: [[RightWingMilitiaFanatic Right-wing militia groups]] and their constituents. Any time they turn up, they're portrayed without any redeeming characteristics, harbor and enforce beliefs straight out of the Puritan era, and are usually trying to kill a lot of people for [[EvilIsPetty childishly petty reasons]]. So far, they've [[spoiler: bombed an embassy]] in ''The Bone Collector'', been annoying supporting antagonists in ''The Empty Chair'' (through Rich Culbeau's gang) and ''The Vanished Man'', [[spoiler: hired the Watchmaker to slaughter hundreds of soldiers and their families]] in ''The Cold Moon'', and [[spoiler: served as TheManBehindTheMan for Billy Haven's mass poisoning scheme]] in ''The Skin Collector''.

* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: ''The Bone Collector'' when compared to later installments of the series. [[OfficialCouple Rhyme and Sachs]] can't stand each other, Fred Dellray is an ObstructiveBureaucrat presented as a minor antagonist, the killer's M.O. centers around [[RaceAgainstTheClock races against time]] and is directly challenging Rhyme from the get-go, and not only does Rhyme [[spoiler: never properly deduce the killer's identity -- he focuses in on a wrong guess moments before the true BigBad stabs his suspect in front of him -- but he ends up taking out the killer himself by luring him in and biting his throat out, whereas later antagonists would always be shot or arrested in a sudden police ambush thanks to his deductions]].

* BaseBreakingCharacter: The Watchmaker. Many readers love him for being Rhyme's ArchEnemy and a brilliant {{Foil}} capable of matching his wits like no other, and for the labyrinthine schemes he inevitably draws up. Others hate him for his VillainSue traits and Deaver's tendency to have him take the place of potentially more interesting villains, and think it's time for the novels to finish up his story for good and move on. [[TakeAThirdOption Still others]] like him in moderation, but wish Deaver [[spoiler: hadn't brought him out of jail so quickly after his arrest and made him into TheManBehindTheMan in ''The Skin Collector'']].

* MagnificentBastard: Every villain is this to some extent, but [[ProfessionalKiller the Coffin Dancer]], [[MasterOfDisguise the Conjurer]], [[TheCracker 522]], and [[ArchEnemy the Watchmaker]] are the most notable examples.
** The Coffin Dancer [[spoiler: disguises himself as a bum and spends weeks peddling drugs on the streets to establish himself, coasts under the radar of suspicion by hiring ''another'' ProfessionalKiller -- Stephen Kall -- to go after the targets he himself was hired for, sets up a "coincidental" meeting with Kall to follow and monitor him as the police assume him to be the Coffin Dancer, and finally kills him under circumstances that cause the police to assume he was just another victim, all so he can get himself sent to a safe house with his targets]].
** The Conjurer [[spoiler: disguises himself as his deceased mentor so expertly that Rhyme only realizes he isn't the same man at the end, sets up a DoubleSubversion to trick police away from his revenge plot by leaving evidence that said plot was the distraction from his job as a ProfessionalKiller, and thinks far enough ahead to wear undetectable makeup and prosthetics allowing him to [[BoomHeadshot fake being shot in the head]] during a struggle with his arresting officer]].
** The Watchmaker is the reigning champion of this trope, to a divisive degree -- ''The Cold Moon'', where his grand scheme only [[LateArrivalSpoiler reveals him as the villain at the climax]], is barely scraping the iceberg. In ''The Burning Wire'', he [[spoiler: manages to set up a grand ruse to trick Rhyme and the police into thinking he was carrying out a hit in Mexico City, then makes his way to New York undetected and carries out a series of complex electricity-based attacks while planting evidence pointing first at deceased electrician Raymond Galt and then at the owners of the electricity company, ''and then'' distracts everyone with a purported attack on a convention center while heading to Rhyme's house to kill him]]. Think that's insane? In ''The Skin Collector'', [[spoiler: he sets himself up to be smuggled some tetrodotoxin while in jail, [[FakingTheDead fakes his own death]] with it, and reveals that he laid the groundwork for Billy Haven's schemes as one giant distraction while he disguises himself as his own lawyer in such a way that he fools Ron Pulaski on multiple occasions, ultimately slipping through Rhyme's grasp yet again just as people start to realize he might not be dead.]]