What to do if you can’t create a lovely villain?

<< I think it is also possible to make a hero-psychopath one hundred percent sick and revolting, and still make him fascinating for his very blackness and all-round depravity. I very nearly did this with Bruno in Strangers on a Train , for even Bruno’s generosity is neither consistent nor well-placed, and there is nothing else to be said in his favor. But in that story, Bruno’s evil was offset by Guy’s “goodness,” which considerably simplified the problem I had of providing a likable hero, as Guy became the likable hero. It depends on the writer’s skill, whether he can have a frolic with the evil in his hero-psychopath. If he can, then the book is entertaining, and in that case there is no reason why the reader should have to “like” the hero. If there must be reader-identification, a term I am rather tired of, then provide the reader with a lesser character or two (preferably one who is not murdered by the hero-psychopath) with whom he can identify. >>

Plotting and writing suspense fiction. Patricia Highsmith.