I agree with you about the power of powerful jerks, but I thought that Felix was supposed have great charisma even among the aristocracy, and I just didn't see it. More of him doing witty evil put-downs would have helped, actually.

His madness didn't work for me at all, though-- he seemed like a sane person hallucinating, if that makes sense. And the narrowness of his hallucinations-- people with animal heads-- made them unconvincing to me as either hallucinations or madness. They were just too orderly.

I did very much like Snitter as a mad POV. I can't think of many others I liked offhand in fiction, though I can think of a number of retrospective accounts of various types of mental illness (and delirium, and drug trips) that convey the experience brilliantly. Alfred Bester's "Fondly Fahrenheit" is good.