The first book in the Ruinous Love Trilogy came to my attention thanks to my fellow Cannonballers. I feel like I went from knowing absolutely nothing about this book or its author to being flooded with information about it and somehow still managing to go into the reading experience with extraordinarily little spoiled for me (something I hope to accomplish with my own review). Malin’s review from March was the linchpin as I don’t traditionally go in for dark romance but if Malin gave it her blessing, figured I could handle it.
The elevator pitch for Butcher & Blackbird can be boiled down to two serial killers of serial killers have a meet cute over a dead body and proceed to form an unlikely friendship of sorts wherein they meet once a year to compete to murder another serial killer, and through that experience fall in love. But that does not capture, at all, the zany romcom qualities of this book. Nor does it capture the long list of trigger warnings on this book (I can hear you thinking that surely mentioning murder and serial killers several times in the description will clue you in. No, it does not, you must read the trigger warnings at the beginning of the book or the author’s website before embarking on this one because its A LOT.)
A story like this succeeds or fails on its leads and Weaver does an excellent job of crafting two characters that leap off the page and allow you to understand their macabre hobbies. Sloane and Rowan are excellent creations (as are the supporting characters, who will reappear in the next two books in the series). Sloane Sutherland, known as the Orb Weaver to the FBI who cannot track or identify her, or understand the art she leaves behind, is closed off from the world having exactly one friend when we meet her and not in contact with her family. She is also brilliant, and paranoid for good reasons. Rowan is an award-winning chef by day and brutal murderer by night as well as being affable and outgoing and extremely loyal to his brothers. He’s a bit of a flirt and it takes Sloane literal years to understand that he is completely head over heels in love with her, and their competition has always been an excuse to spend time with her, when he knows that if he hadn’t suggested it at their first meeting he would never have seen her again.
The steamy part of the book picks up about 60% of the way through and goes from zero to one hundred. I thought the balance between the sections, with the more gory, murder bits towards the beginning and end and the more traditional romance plotting in the middle (minus the pining which is all throughout the book) worked well, but I can see readers not vibing with Weaver’s choices (wanting more nitty-gritty of the murder planning or serial killer research, or maybe wanting the feelings of the romance to show up earlier instead of the physical attraction).
faintingviolet 