Title: A Serial Killer’s Guide to Marriage

Author: Asia Mackay

Genre: Mystery, Thriller

Rating: ★★☆☆☆

Why I read it: Won it in an Instagram contest

I had such high hopes for this book! Morally gray characters? Check. An ambitious husband and wife killing team? Check. Lots of murder? Um…

A Serial Killer’s Guide to Marriage follows Haze and Fox as they navigate their life as new parents. They are an ordinary married couple with a baby. Except for one small detail – they’re ex-serial killers. They had it all: an enviable London lifestyle, five-star travels, and plenty of bad men to kill. Then Hazel fell pregnant and they gave it all up for life in the suburbs; dinner parties instead of body disposal. But recently, Hazel has started to feel that itch again. When she kills someone behind Fox’s back and brings the police to their door, she must do anything she can to protect her family. 

Told through dual-POV, I enjoyed that you got to see both sides of this couple as they navigate adjusting to their new lives. HOWEVER, the first 100 pages were filled with whining about how the other doesn’t listen, or doesn’t understand them. At multiple points, I wanted to scream JUST TALK TO EACH OTHER. YOU’RE A MARRIED COUPLE WHO DOESN’T KNOW HOW TO COMMUNICATE? YET YOU CAN MURDER PEOPLE? Anyway.

I thought this book would be filled with a lot more detail about their murders, not about how they really just needed marriage counseling and a lesson on how to trust each other. Toward the end, you get a glimpse, but I would have preferred to see them in action together more often, versus spending most of the book hating each other. 

On a positive note, I did appreciate the commentary around following a “conventional” or “unconventional” family path – specifically, a woman unsure about becoming a mother, finding herself in that situation, and coming to terms with it. Which sounds bad, but I thought it was well done. 

This book had short chapters, and for the most part, it was entertaining. But like I said, it could have used more murder, or a plot twist, or something. One other potentially cringe-y thing for others, I know it is for me, there were so many modern references included: Instagram, Amazon, the concept of being “woke”, “they’re taking our jobs”, mentions of a global pandemic, etc. etc. I don’t know about you, but I read to escape the BS of reality, not to be reminded of it, so this rubbed me the wrong way. I think there’s a fine line authors have to walk to make their work culturally relevant without bringing their readers too close to reality. 

Plenty of other reviews mention that the ending is unrealistic, and I absolutely agree. However, I’m not sure any other ending would have worked. Without this ending, the book would have been entirely pointless, in my opinion, so I’m willing to overlook the fairytale ending in this instance. 

All in all, two stars because I was quite bored, the plot was predictable, and it didn’t present as much of a thriller. 

A quote on page 335 (the second to last page) sums up this book quite nicely: “I should’ve considered just putting the disguises back into their box and talking to my wife.” Bingo.

TL;DR: Would I recommend it to a friend? Maybe. I think some readers may like it, but only if you go into it with very low expectations.