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Friday, May 5, 2017

Roses of May by Dot Hutchison


I received a copy of this from Net galley and the publisher in return for an honest review





Four months after the explosion at the Garden, a place where young women known as the Butterflies were kept captive, FBI agents Brandon Eddison, Victor Hanoverian, and Mercedes Ramirez are still entrenched in the aftermath, helping survivors in the process of adjusting to life on the outside. With winter coming to an end, the Butterflies have longer, warmer days of healing ahead. But for the agents, the impending thaw means one gruesome thing: a chilling guarantee that somewhere in the country, another young woman will turn up dead in a church with her throat slit and her body surrounded by flowers.

Priya Sravasti’s sister fell victim to the killer years ago. Now she and her mother move every few months, hoping for a new beginning. But when she ends up in the madman’s crosshairs, the hunt takes on new urgency. Only with Priya’s help can the killer be found—but will her desperate hope for closure compel her to put her very life on the line?


I fell in love with Butterfly Garden. I got a ARC copy and missed my trax stop while reading it. I bought it in paperback and have re read it several times, so I had pretty high hopes for Roses of May. 

I was not disappointed! I bought the physical copy of this novel and can't wait to re read it. I loved finding out what happened to the Butterflies especially Inara and Bliss. The author didn't try to give them happily ever afters and I enjoyed how real it felt.You could tell when it came to the victims and survivors mentality the author did her research.

The story of Priya and her family was very intriguing. This new serial killer murders girls in churches during spring and leaves different flowers on them. He is fascinated with Priya after killing her sister several years earlier. Priya is not a white character either, she's Indian (family is Hindi though not Muslim) and she is a hard ass. She struggles with an eating disorder- binge eating until she pukes- to help cope with her emotions and the stress. I could relate to her because I struggle with a very similar anxiety and stress induced disorder.

Her mother was wonderful and scary and the vets Priya plays chess with are quite a handful of lovable characters.

I was absolutely captivated by the characters, the plot and the writing, I didn't want to put it down and cannot wait for the third installment.

It was also nice to see inside the Quantico 3, as Priya calls them. In the first novel we only see them in the interrogation room with Maya/Inara and this gave a more inside look at the FBI agents.

So much emotion swarmed me while reading this book, the author does a great job of making her disgusting and horrible serial killers seem sympathetic and understandable, like you almost don't want them to get caught...then stop yourself, shudder and say, "yuck, no he needs to die." Kind of the same feeling I got when reading Lolita.

I can't criticize much in this book, there are a few issues, like I guessed the killer pretty early on, but any problem I had didn't distract from my enjoyment.

If you like serial killers- the weirder and more fucked up the better- pick this up and support this author.

Bright Blessings.