The Butcher's Daughter

Praise for The Butcher’s Daughter

“A wild, high-octane, blood-soaked tale.”
—The New York Times Book Review

“An often-gruesome work of darkest Victorian noir . . . It is an undeniably impressive performance: a Penny Dreadful whose most startling turns of plot seem worthy of Charles Dickens and whose most unexpected shocks lie in cunning wait until the final sentences.”
—Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal

“Your fingers may bleed with paper cuts as you tear through The Butcher’s Daughter. Retailed with consummate confidence, this novel draws out of the foggy demimonde of Victorian London all manner of mayhem. I am spellbound. You will be too, should you attend the tale.”
—Gregory Maguire, author of Wicked

“Grisly, spellbinding, and oddly touching . . . Demchuk and Clark get their arms bloody to the elbow reaching deep into the carcass of a story about life at the margins and the gruesome allure of wanton violence.”
—Gretchen Felker-Martin, author of Manhunt and Cuckoo

“Engrossing and exquisitely detailed. A twisty tale worthy of the enigmatic Mrs. Lovett.”
—Kelley Armstrong, New York Times bestselling author of Bitten and I’ll Be Waiting

“A Victorian nightmare. Demchuk and Clark present an assembly of communications and reports that together form temporal windows to a slaughterhouse, turning us into voyeurs glimpsing the edges of carnage. All the ingredients of a macabre treat.”
—Hailey Piper, Bram Stoker Award-winning author of Queen of Teeth and All the Hearts You Eat

“A consistently clever and harrowing fin-de-siècle horror, The Butcher’s Daughter draws its eerie narrative harmonies from a cacophony of documents. Demchuk and Clark are equally adept in blending genres, creating a unique mixture of sensation fiction and literary horror. Tremendous fun.”
—Naben Ruthnum, author of Helpmeet

“A wonderfully sophisticated horror. The Butcher’s Daughter is a gloomy, disgusting, and suspenseful rollercoaster ride, brought to vivid life by two exceptionally talented writers. At its heart, it is a tale about bodies—especially women’s bodies—about freedom and agency, and those who wish to control other human beings down to their guts. An historical novel, yes, but very much spun from this current bloody moment. Bleak, witty, and disturbing.”
—Richard Mirabella, author of Brother & Sister Enter the Forest

“Bloody and beautiful, The Butcher’s Daughter is a visceral novel that grips the reader and refuses to let go. David Demchuk and Corinne Leigh Clark brilliantly reimagine a classic, giving it new depths, new horrors, and new layers to peel back by centering the character of Mrs. Lovett and rightfully letting her tell her own tale in her own voice. The moment I started reading, I didn’t want to put it down.”
—A. C. Wise, author of Wendy, Darling

“The seedy underbelly of Victorian London comes to life in this deliciously dark novel, with mad scientists, murderous cults, merciless madams, and, of course, meat pies. If Sarah Waters had written penny dreadfuls, it might look something like this, but only David Demchuk and Corinne Leigh Clark could make me hungry while reading about cannibalism.”
—Nino Cipri, author of Dead Girls Don’t Dream

“Irresistible.”
—Broadway World

“While Sweeney Todd makes an appearance in The Butcher’s Daughter, rest assured this story is all about Mrs. Lovett. This novel offers us a deep exploration of her as an individual, the ‘why’s’ that shaped her into the person she eventually becomes. She transforms before the reader’s eyes, skillfully mastered by the authors. The choice to present this to us in the epistolary format helps with creating, building, and maintaining suspense.”
—The Fandomentals

“Those who enjoy being immersed in the gritty, visceral, and historically accurate world of Victorian London as seen in Alan Moore’s From Hell or Virginia Feito’s Victorian Psycho will eagerly devour this tale.”
—Booklist

“A bloody good time . . . Though the authors fiddle with the Sweeney legend as most horror and Broadway fans know it, they build to a startling final twist that readers will think worth the liberties taken.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Demchuk (Red X) and debut author Clark have crafted a grim tale of Victorian London with appeal to readers of classic horror retold from new perspectives, such as Lucy Undying by Kiersten White and Eynhallow by Tim McGregor.”
—Library Journal


Praise for David Demchuk

“Can a horror novel be too disturbing? David Demchuk’s Red X begs that question, not because of any excess of gore or violence but because of its singular and unflinching dark vision. That’s a good thing—too much contemporary horror fiction plays for easy shocks and even easier sentimental tears, and Demchuk is clearly after something deeper.”
—Toronto Star

“[Red X is] a book full of heart and righteous fury, an urban nightmare with some retro-horror stylings that sidesteps that genre’s usual pitfalls of splatter and pessimism to deliver a story of emotional heft and guarded optimism. While it’s relentless and can be incredibly disturbing, there are also moments of beauty, hope, and a certain melancholy. It’s a complex, disturbing, challenging, and compulsively readable work that commands your attention, and indeed deserves it.”
—Tor Nightfire