The full cast narration of the audiobook was exceptional, bringing the characters to life in a way that truly enhanced the storytelling experience. Each voice added depth and emotion, making it easy to immerse in the narrative. I found the epistolary format particularly compelling; letters and journal entries provided an intimate glimpse into the characters’ thoughts and experiences, creating a rich and engaging storyline.

I highly recommend the audiobook for its captivating performances, but I also want to highlight how much I enjoyed the physical book. The writing was beautifully crafted and drew me in, allowing me to savor the nuances of the prose. Whether listening or reading, I was thoroughly captivated by this story from start to finish.

A compelling story, but a disappointing ending. throughout the book, a relationship is built that is let down at the end. Though the final twist is clever, it doesn't satisfy. The story is compelling enough, but left me wanting more.

A super entertaining and darkly expansive extension to the Sweeney Todd lore, I just wished the feminist underpinnings were more punchy and felt less like generic platitudes. The gore and violence was wild, the story was fast-paced, I loved the meta playing with form, I just felt a bit let down by some of the messaging. An excellent depiction of one of my favourite tropes - the unreliable narrator!

Thank you NetGalley and Hell's Hundred | Recorded Books for this ARC Copy! 4.5 Stars rounded up.

I was so excited when I saw this book and received an ARC Copy. I have always loved Sweeny Todds story so hearing the story of the baker was so intriguing. I was so invested in this story, this poor girl just went through one horrible thing after the other, but she was so strong and resilient through everything that was thrown at her and managed to create a place for herself out of nothing. I was also pleasantly surprised that this was Sapphic.

I have consumed the story of Sweeney Todd in numerous formats and Mrs. Lovett was always lurking in the story. Now she gets her chance to shine.

I love epistolary novels. I think this was an excellent choice to tell the story of Mrs. Lovett. We get her full life story through her letters to a journalist and a book left behind. From the start of her life as a butcher's daughter, to her time as a house maid in two very different “homes”, to her career as a pie maker with a terrifying tenant, her story is filled with misadventure.

There was a lot of intrigue happening in and around the Priory she was hiding in as she wrote her story. Little hints were dropped throughout her letters so you get a sense of creeping menace leading up to the final events in her entries. The most brilliant moment, in my opinion, is the reveal of her son at the very end of the novel. I won't spoil it here, but I was shocked and delighted with that conclusion.

Recommended for: body horror readers; Sweeney Todd fans

Content warning: gore; violence; cannibalism; surgical experimentation

I received a digital ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I started this book and life was lifing, so I knew my brain wouldn't be able to give it the proper attention it deserved. Put it aside for a bit and came back. I knew I needed to be ready to fully immerse myself in this story because it would be one of my favs. So glad I did because my instincts were right. I loved the way the book was told through letters and documents, yet it didn't take away from the story, and instead added to the intimacy. This is not your average re-telling. It's creative and creepy, and so well done. The Butcher's Daughter has earned a spot on the books I'll always recommend.

What a fun historical horror novel! Entirely drawn in epistolary form, The Butcher's Daughter tells the story of Mrs. Lovett, Sweeney Todd's partner in crime, and it does so with wit, suspense, and empathy. There is so much to love here if you're into novels set in Victorian London - freemasonry, mad science, brothels, and an exquisitely drawn portrait of the drudgeries of everyday life for the less than fortunate. I will be recommending this one often for all of those reasons, but also because it has a killer ending.

The plot and ideas were interesting, but the epistolary format took me out of the story a bit (why was Sister Catherine writing for Margaret at the beginning?) and then didn't pay off enough to make it worthwhile except as a throwback to Victorian novels. Tension build was uneven but most of it paid off. I enjoyed the references to different versions of the Sweeney Todd story, and some of the writing was very evocative.

This book started off super rough. I don’t mind a book written with different types of media, but this book didn’t flow smoothly. That made it extremely hard to get invested in the story. That being said I did muster enough interest to keep reading and slowly the book seems to flow a smidge easier. If you are looking for “Mrs. Lovett” to meet Sweeny Todd right away you will be sorely disappointed. You will have to wait till about 75% of the way through the book before their paths cross. Now that being said, the journey she takes to get to meeting him is extremely important to the plot. I did enjoy how everything tied together and the final twist was perfection. Do I think that readers will be enchanted by this book, maybe if they can muddle through, but I don’t know how many people will be able to get past the bumpy story telling. Thank you to Soho Press and Netgalley for allowing me to read an advance copy of this title.

I’ve been loving dipping into horror again recently and when The Butcher's Daughter crossed my radar I was immediately intrigued. I’m not an incredible connoisseur of Sweeney Todd, but I’ve read some retellings and watched some movies so I was intrigued about how the story of Mrs Lovett would be approached. Unfortunately, I was disappointed with this one.

The style of telling the story via letters I think will be much better in physical format (when the letters from different people and fonts can be used to better distinguish different people sending letters to the journalist) or in audiobook format. I don’t recommend the ebook for this particular story unless there are serious format changes from the eARC.

Regardless of format, the first quarter of the novel is solid and I was devouring the story until it started to fall apart at the Doctor’s home. Once Mrs Lovett (Margaret at the time) is impregnated during an occult ritual that she believes is a dream (yeah that happens), the threads of the story begin to disintegrate.

From that point, Margaret moves on and is taken into a brothel where she works as a maid and a caretaker for a young deaf girl while she works with clients. I honestly did not see a point to having Margaret at the brothel besides simply being a place where she could spend time until the baby was born. The deaf girl who she becomes close friends with (and could possibly read a sapphic relationship with, which I would have loved) is given no agency and actually shoved into a different area of the plot that is incredibly unsatisfying.

The rest of the plot feels like a tumbling of clunky coincidences to get Margaret into the position of Mrs Lovett and it is far past the 50% mark when the mantle of Mrs Lovett is taken and Sweeney Todd is introduced. I would have preferred a closer examination of their relationship, but instead this story treats them as acquaintances stuck with each other, which is a choice, but not one I prefer.

What really had me land on my final rating was a lack of continuity so stunning that I could not tell if it was a choice regarding an unreliable narrator or if it was legit just missed in editing. It felt lazy and smacked me as a reader believing I had missed something - but no, it’s revealed later in the book after having been said at the 50% mark.

I will say the final few lines of this novel are incredibly schlocky and I loved them - they were almost worth getting through the entire book for. I think this book would have been better if it would have leaned 100% into the schlockiness and embraced the penny dreadful essence entirely.

*I received an eARC from Soho Press, Hell's Hundred, & NetGalley. All opinions are my own*

This was a delightfully bloody take on the Sweeney Todd story and I really enjoyed it! The choice by authors Clark and Demchuk to tell the story through letters and news clippings was very interesting and effective. I thought the various London settings were vividly portrayed, and I was very invested in the characters' outcomes. I thought Clark and Demchuk did an excellent job balancing the necessary ambiguity of an unreliable narrator with enough hints as to how the story actually happened/ends. I really enjoyed that last little twist at the end!
My only complaint has to do with the formatting of the digital ARC I received. Because the story is told entirely through various documents, the digital ARC was unable to format them correctly, so it was difficult to parse separate sections at times. I'm sure the finalized digital version will have fixed that problem. I fully intend to purchase a physical copy and am excited to re-read it with the correct formatting!

firstly, thank you to the publisher for an arc and alc!

3.5 stars

i absolutely adore the sweeney todd movie starring johnny depp, helena bonam carter, and alan rickman, as well as the broadway play (which i saw with josh groban!!) so when i saw there would be a novel highlighting mrs. lovett’s backstory i begged for it on netgalley and edelweiss.

i absolutely adored the first 50% of this book — mrs. lovett’s origin is sad, and she is a victim of circumstance that inevitably hardens her into the murderous woman she became.

while i loved the originality and expansion of mrs. lovett’s character (specifically her sapphic lover), i did not like the direction the authors took in changing the entirety of the plot i knew. while it’s not necessarily bad, and i still enjoyed the changes, i was unprepared for a complete change in plot, as i was under the assumption it would be more character development and expansion.

as for the audio — there was a full cast, and i adore full cast narration. the narrators did a phenomenal job.

overall, this was still a fantastically gorey victorian horror novel, but fans of the movie/broadway show note the changes!

The Butcher’s Daughter was everything I wanted in historical fiction horror. I really loved our main character, she was so strong, slightly unhinged, vengeful. I was intrigued with what the doctor was doing, the eras of body-snatching and live human experimentation days really peaks my interest but what really had me was Sweeney Todd! When I initially picked this up, I didn’t read any blurbs, I was hooked on the title. Imagine my excitement when our MC became Mrs. Lovett and Sweeney Todd was her tenant, I wanted so much more from him! His character was written so well. The ending really had me too - is her son truly who I think he is?! 🤯 I mean, what she said about everyone will know who he is and the timeline… it HAS to be him. I hope there’s a sequel! I listened to this on audio, Jill Tanner, Steven Crossley, Amy Scanlon all did a great job - it was amazing. Thanks to Recorded Books/RB Media and SoHo Press/Hell’s Hundred for my copy!

If you loved Sweeney Todd, then this is a title for you. Featuring Mrs. Lovett before she meets Sweeney, this novel gives the reader an inside scoop on her motivations and a glimpse of just how far she will go to survive.

It’s 1887 in London. A correspondence between a journalist, Miss Emily Gibson and the infamous Mrs. Lovett, Sweeney Todd’s accomplice has been found. She is known for baking men into pies and selling them in her shop.

This starts as a slow burn horror story. It is not a re-telling of Sweeney Todd. We get full look at our main character as fleshed out brilliantly. The horrors she went through. It’s gruesome at times and know that this has ALL OF THE TRIGGER WARNINGS! Period!

The descriptive scenes were done very well as I could see everything so vividly in London 1887. The writing is top notch.

The MC was phenomenal!! I could feel all the emotions as she described them. The twists will blow your mind as well. I alternated between the e-ARC and the ALC.

I really enjoyed this gruesome tale! I recommend it for horror fans with NO TRIGGER WARNINGS!

4 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

thank you for this, but I could not get into it. may not be the right time for me.
it was very confusing to read along the letter correspondence.

I'm sure it will get better, but for the moment I can not get into it

If you fed Sarah Waters and Angela Carter into a meat grinder and baked them into a Jack Ketchum pie you still wouldn’t come close to the sensation of reading this. Just superb.

A fresh retelling of Sweeney Todd, starring Mrs. Lovett as our protagonist.

What is already a well known story has been used to create something new, while still retaining the core of the original. The story is told through diaries and letters, creating the effect of reading the newspaper while living in victorian times, and discovering the events of this story.

This was a fun read, I always wanted to know what happens next, and while I don't read much historical fiction, the author made the reader feel right at home. Go into this blind, while some things may not be a big surprise for those who know Sweeney Todd, this has more than enough to not feel like going through the same story again.

For fans of retellings, victorian times, and a crimson baked barbershop.

This gothic, blood-soaked feminist retelling of Sweeney Todd will have you celebrating women's wrongs.

The set up of this book as a series of letters between a journalist trying to find an aging Mrs. Lovett after the famous events of her pie shop and the barber shop above it, is really interesting. The authors are already assuming we know a little of the dark deeds that happened, but give Mrs. Lovett the time and space to tell the entire story from her perspective - including how she got her name.

I love feminist retellings and this was the right amount of dark and dreadful. This isn't a fast-paced story, which is fine because I liked seeing what terrible tragedy was going to happen to Lovett next and how she'd endure.

While Lovett was surrounded by terrible things happening to her, I never felt like she was a victim of her circumstances. She always had agency and like black mold, she thrived.

Pick this up if you want
🔪 Feminist retelling of Sweeney Todd
🔪 Sapphic Gothic Horror
🔪 Supporting women’s wrongs
🔪 Epistolary
🔪 Cannibalism
🔪 Meat pies

This book is best read while sitting in an empty kitchen, cleaning blood from your butcher’s knife.

Rating:1-1,5/5 stars
Thank you to NetGalley and Soho Press for the ARC.

This book opens with promise—an epistolary format and a moody, gothic tone that hints at something in the realm of Sweeney Todd. Unfortunately, what follows never quite lives up to that potential.

While the concept of telling the story through letters is appealing, the execution feels off. The so-called letters read more like stylized first-person narration interrupted by dates and signatures, rather than actual correspondence between characters. It lacks the organic, back-and-forth nature that makes epistolary storytelling immersive and emotionally impactful.

Tonally, the writing leans into the melodrama, but without the payoff. It reads like fanfiction—specifically fanfiction for fans of Sweeney Todd—but without a clear direction or much narrative momentum. Despite my interest in the premise, I found myself increasingly detached from the story and its characters. I simply couldn’t get into it.

I’m truly grateful to have received an advance copy, and I really wanted to enjoy this—but ultimately, it left me wondering what the purpose of the story was, and why it was told in this particular way.