History YMMV / TheRedNecklace

* CompleteMonster (includes ''The Silver Blade''): [[AristocratsAreEvil Count--later Citizen--Kalliovski]] is a serial-killing LoanShark in the time of UsefulNotes/TheFrenchRevolution. A blackmailer and consummate destroyer-of-lives who always carries a book full of the names of those he keeps [[EvilDebtCollector under his crushing thumb]], Kalliovski is only too gleeful to [[SerialKiller murder]] those who don't pay their debts or simply get in his way, ranging from a magician who recognizes him from before his days as nobility, to UsefulNotes/{{Romani}} families he [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain hunts for sport]], to the mother of the novel's heroine Sido de Villeduval. Kalliovski deigns to make the underage Sido his bride as well, [[MaritalRapeLicense gloating how he'll have her in his bed whether she wants it or not]]. Kalliovski also creates magical automata out of the bodies of his victims, a pastime expanded upon in ''The Silver Blade''. Whether from those he's sent to the guillotine or killed with his own hands, Kalliovski seeks to create a being "without the inconvenience of a soul" from these automata; his most prized of them are the Seven Sisters Macabre, each a woman he's murdered and preserved in beautiful undeath. Even love cannot dampen Kalliosvki's evil; when he encounters a woman who "threatened the perfect void of his being", Kalliovski murders her and promptly attempts to kill the child he bore with her as well.
* EvilIsSexy: When it's Creator/TomHiddleston narrating the Count's lines it is.

* CompleteMonster (includes ''The Silver Blade''): [[AristocratsAreEvil Count--later Citizen--Kalliovski]] is a serial-killing LoanShark in the time of UsefulNotes/TheFrenchRevolution. A blackmailer and consummate destroyer-of-lives who always carries a book full of the names of those he keeps [[EvilDebtCollector under his crushing thumb]], Kalliovski is only too gleeful to [[SerialKiller murder]] those who don't pay their debts or simply get in his way, ranging from a magician who recognizes him from before his days as nobility, to UsefulNotes/{{Romani}} families he [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain hunts for sport]], to the mother of the novel's heroine Sido. Kalliovski deigns to make the underage Sido his bride as well, [[MaritalRapeLicense gloating how he'll have her in his bed whether she wants it or not]]. Kalliovski also creates magical automata out of the bodies of his victims, a pastime expanded upon in ''The Silver Blade''. Whether from those he's sent to the guillotine or killed with his own hands, Kalliovski seeks to create a being "without the inconvenience of a soul" from these automata; his most prized of them are the Seven Sisters Macabre, each a woman he's murdered and preserved in beautiful undeath. Even love cannot dampen Kalliosvki's evil; when he encounters a woman who "threatened the perfect void of his being", Kalliovski murders her and promptly attempts to kill the child he bore with her as well.

* CompleteMonster (includes ''The Silver Blade'']]: [[AristocratsAreEvil Count--later Citizen--Kalliovski]] is a serial-killing LoanShark in the time of UsefulNotes/TheFrenchRevolution. A blackmailer and consummate destroyer-of-lives who always carries a book full of the names of those he keeps [[EvilDebtCollector under his crushing thumb]], Kalliovski is only too gleeful to [[SerialKiller murder]] those who don't pay their debts or simply get in his way, ranging from a magician who recognizes him from before his days as nobility, to UsefulNotes/{{Romani}} families he [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain hunts for sport]], to the mother of the novel's heroine Sido. Kalliovski deigns to make the underage Sido his bride as well, [[MaritalRapeLicense gloating how he'll have her in his bed whether she wants it or not]]. Kalliovski also creates magical automata out of the bodies of his victims, a pastime expanded upon in ''The Silver Blade''. Whether from those he's sent to the guillotine or killed with his own hands, Kalliovski seeks to create a being "without the inconvenience of a soul" from these automata; his most prized of them are the Seven Sisters Macabre, each a woman he's murdered and preserved in beautiful undeath. Even love cannot dampen Kalliosvki's evil; when he encounters a woman who "threatened the perfect void of his being", Kalliovski murders her and promptly attempts to kill the child he bore with her as well.

* CompleteMonster: The Count is a ruthless, cunning murderer who preys on young Sido and planning to rape her. He murders poor [[spoiler: Topolain]] for knowing too much as well as [[spoiler: Yann's mother for rejecting him.]]

* EvilIsSexy: When it's Creator/TomHiddleston narrating the Count's lines it is.
* RealWomenDontWearDresses: Sido has caught some flack from some reviewers for being so meek, soft, "passive" (no matter that she didn't exactly have much choice), and for "not doing anything". Never mind that women were essentially powerless in the day, much less a young girl.

* CompleteMonster: The Count. He murders those who fail to pay back debts and anyone else he thinks needs to die by strangulation, is [[spoiler: the one who killed Yann's mother, also killed Sido's mother for rejecting him, and was going to have sex with the much-younger Sido with or without her consent.]] And that's only a few things in the first book!

* RealWomenDontWearDresses: Sido has caught some flack from some reviewers for being so meek, soft, "passive" (no matter that she didn't exactly have much choice), and for "not doing anything".

* CompleteMonster: Count Kalliovski, evil loan shark who strangers people with the TitleDrop, threatens to rape Sido, [[spoiler: and is implied to have raped Yann's mother.]]

* EvilIsSexy: When it's Creator/{{TomHiddleston}} narrating the Count's lines it is.