It wasn’t really by choice. But I’d take a raccoon to the face for you any day, Rose Evans.
Brynne Weaver, Scythe & Sparrow
When I first picked up Scythe and Sparrow, I was a little apprehensive. Not because I was worried about which food would be ruined for me this time—after what Butcher and Blackbird did to orzo and ice cream, and what Leather and Lark did to pizza—but because, after loving Butcher and Blackbird, Leather and Lark was a bit of a disappointment for me. B&B was lightning in a bottle, with its unhinged wildness and shock value, but L&L fell flat for me due to a repeated plotline and shallow plot continuity. I was looking forward to reading Scythe and Sparrow because I hoped it would pull me out of my contemporary romance slump in a way Deep End couldn’t. Unfortunately, while there were some highlights, this book also felt repetitive—plus, the insta-love took over where I was hoping for a slow burn.
This post contains spoilers.
Scythe and Sparrow Full Summary
Scythe and Sparrow begins with Rose, “The Sparrow,” working in a circus as a tarot reader and motorcycle stunt performer. Rose uses her cards and other means to help women suffering from domestic violence. When a woman approaches her tent, desperate to escape her abusive husband, Rose takes matters into her own hands and tracks the guy down. She brings a baseball bat to Matthew Cranwell, intending to kill him. However, he fights back and brutally breaks her leg. Rose barely makes it to Fionn’s medical clinic in Nebraska. Desperate for help, she breaks into the clinic, but her femoral fracture overwhelms her, and she passes out just as Fionn arrives.
Fionn takes her to the hospital, rushes her into surgery, and stabilizes her. From the moment he sees her, he’s drawn to her.
Once Rose is discharged, the circus moves on without her while she recovers. Unable to get into an RV with her injury, Fionn offers her a place to stay. With nowhere else to go, she moves in with him, and the two begin an uneasy cohabitation.
As the story unfolds, we learn that it wasn’t Lachlan but Fionn who killed their father. While Lachlan strangled their abusive father, Callum Kane, it was Fionn who delivered the fatal blow—stabbing him in the spine. The guilt still haunts him, driving him to become a doctor as a way to atone for what he sees as his ultimate sin. He’s also been hiding out in Nebraska, nursing a broken heart after his long-term girlfriend rejected his marriage proposal.
While living with Fionn, Rose integrates into Hartford’s tight-knit community. She becomes best friends with the women in Fionn’s crochet club, the Suture Sisters—a group he originally joined, mistakenly thinking it was a medical society.
In a moment of impulsivity, Rose strikes again—this time targeting Eric, the abusive husband of the nurse who took care of her. She ambushes him behind his truck and kills him. Afterward, she calls Fionn, begging for help in disposing of the body. Despite his better judgment, Fionn shows up and helps her. This is when Rose also confesses that she deliberately started the fight with Matthew Cranwell.
Despite Fionn’s deep fears about his own capacity for violence, the two begin a friends-with-benefits arrangement. However, their relationship quickly intensifies as they fall for each other without admitting it.
The story interweaves with the timelines of Butcher and Blackbird and Leather and Lark. At one point, Sloane and Rowan arrive in Nebraska after Sloane is injured during their annual murder game.
Eventually, Rose gets her cast off, but Fionn can’t find the courage to ask her to stay. So, she leaves—returning to the road, while Fionn visits her whenever he can.
Rose later ends up in Boston, working for Rowan at a haunted house attraction. Realizing he’s in love with her, Fionn follows her there, finally ready to confess. However, Matthew Cranwell tracks Rose down at the worst possible moment. A deadly chase unfolds through the haunted house, ending with Rose finally killing him. Fionn arrives to find her standing over Cranwell’s body, and the two reunite.
Since this murder is much bigger and riskier, Fionn calls Leander for help cleaning up the scene. But Leander’s assistance comes at a steep price—he blackmails Fionn into traveling to Croatia to provide medical care for his mob clients. Worse, he forces Fionn to keep it a secret. Left with no choice, Fionn breaks up with Rose.
Heartbroken and unaware that Fionn is trying to protect her, Rose leaves the next morning. However, before heading back to the circus, she has coffee with Lark. (This perfectly aligns with the ending events of Leather and Lark—because right after this, Lark is taken.) When Rose, Fionn, and Lachlan rescue Lark, Rose is gravely injured in the process.
Fionn stays by her hospital bed until she’s stable—then leaves for Croatia. When Rose wakes up, she finds herself alone once more. As she heals, she returns to the road, but Fionn begins sending her letters along the way—each one accompanied by a tarot card and a confession of his love.
Eventually, the final card arrives—The Lovers. Fionn asks Rose to meet him where her circus originally set up.
When she does, they finally reunite, confess their love, and Rose forgives Fionn.
Scythe and Sparrow begins with Rose, “The Sparrow,” working in a circus as a tarot reader and motorcycle stunt performer. Rose uses her cards and other means to help women suffering from domestic violence. When a woman approaches her tent, desperate to escape her abusive husband, Rose takes matters into her own hands and tracks the guy down. She brings a baseball bat to Matthew Cranwell, intending to kill him. However, he fights back and brutally breaks her leg. Rose barely makes it to Fionn’s medical clinic in Nebraska. Desperate for help, she breaks into the clinic, but her femoral fracture overwhelms her, and she passes out just as Fionn arrives.
Fionn takes her to the hospital, rushes her into surgery, and stabilizes her. From the moment he sees her, he’s drawn to her.
Once Rose is discharged, the circus moves on without her while she recovers. Unable to get into an RV with her injury, Fionn offers her a place to stay. With nowhere else to go, she moves in with him, and the two begin an uneasy cohabitation.
As the story unfolds, we learn that it wasn’t Lachlan but Fionn who killed their father. While Lachlan strangled their abusive father, Callum Kane, it was Fionn who delivered the fatal blow—stabbing him in the spine. The guilt still haunts him, driving him to become a doctor as a way to atone for what he sees as his ultimate sin. He’s also been hiding out in Nebraska, nursing a broken heart after his long-term girlfriend rejected his marriage proposal.
While living with Fionn, Rose integrates into Hartford’s tight-knit community. She **becomes best friends with the women in Fionn’s crochet club, the Suture Sisters—**a group he originally joined, mistakenly thinking it was a medical society.
In a moment of impulsivity, Rose strikes again—this time targeting Eric, the abusive husband of the nurse who took care of her. She ambushes him behind his truck and kills him. Afterward, she calls Fionn, begging for help in disposing of the body. Despite his better judgment, Fionn shows up and helps her. This is when Rose also confesses that she deliberately started the fight with Matthew Cranwell.
Despite Fionn’s deep fears about his own capacity for violence, the two begin a friends-with-benefits arrangement. However, their relationship quickly intensifies as they fall for each other without admitting it.
The story interweaves with the timelines of Butcher and Blackbird and Leather and Lark. At one point, Sloane and Rowan arrive in Nebraska after Sloane is injured during their annual murder game.
Eventually, Rose gets her cast off, but Fionn can’t find the courage to ask her to stay. So, she leaves—returning to the road, while Fionn visits her whenever he can.
Rose later ends up in Boston, working for Rowan at a haunted house attraction. Realizing he’s in love with her, Fionn follows her there, finally ready to confess. However, Matthew Cranwell tracks Rose down at the worst possible moment. A deadly chase unfolds through the haunted house, ending with Rose finally killing him. Fionn arrives to find her standing over Cranwell’s body, and the two reunite.
Since this murder is much bigger and riskier, Fionn calls Leander for help cleaning up the scene. But **Leander’s assistance comes at a steep price—**he blackmails Fionn into traveling to Croatia to provide medical care for his mob clients. Worse, he forces Fionn to keep it a secret. Left with no choice, Fionn breaks up with Rose.
Heartbroken and unaware that Fionn is trying to protect her, Rose leaves the next morning. However, before heading back to the circus, she has coffee with Lark. (This perfectly aligns with the ending events of Leather and Lark—because right after this, Lark is taken.) When Rose, Fionn, and Lachlan rescue Lark, Rose is gravely injured in the process.
Fionn stays by her hospital bed until she’s stable—then leaves for Croatia. When Rose wakes up, she finds herself alone once more. As she heals, she returns to the road, but Fionn **begins sending her letters along the way—each one accompanied by a tarot card and a confession of his love.
Eventually, the final card arrives—The Lovers. Fionn asks Rose to meet him where her circus originally set up.
When she does, they finally reunite, confess their love, and Rose forgives Fionn.
In the epilogue, Fionn proposes, and we see that Sloane and Rowan’s annual murder game has evolved into a full-on family affair—with all three couples hunting despicable men for sport.
Scythe and Sparrow Review
I loved the unhinged insanity of Butcher and Blackbird—a dark romcom with actual gory, disgusting murder elements mixed with unexpectedly sweet and funny romantic moments. They said it would be wild, and I was all in from the start because it was so wonderfully weird—and it delivered. Then came Leather and Lark, and while the explicit content was impeccable and Lachlan remains my all-time favorite MMC of the series, the plot was very what the fuck. I couldn’t stand the “Oh hey, Lark was also a serial killer all along!” twist—it felt cheap, and it couldn’t save the story for me. And the whole giggling, “I make crafts out of dead bodies,” thing? Pick-me-girl energy to the extreme. So, despite my love for Lachlan, I was pretty disappointed.
I was cautiously excited about Scythe and Sparrow because I thought it was a clever setup—we’d already seen glimpses of these two across the first two books, and they were so weird and odd, I couldn’t wait to see what they were going to do. Fionn being a doctor and Rose being a traveling circus stuntwoman? That’s different enough to hook me. Like, how do you expect those two personalities to mesh? Either way, I was kind of excited.
And TL;DR—it was fine. It suffers from the same issue as Leather and Lark—the novelty of the first book is gone, even with the layered timeline. Fionn is sweet with his crocheting, health-nut tendencies. Rose is a wild turkey on the loose. But maybe I’m expecting the wrong things from these books at this point, because overall, this one felt very… ehhh.
So, let’s walk through it—with books like these, we should expect romance with a dark twist, right?
We got the dark twist… and then some. Rose is a vigilante for abused women—amazing. But I’m not super into the “Oh look, all three serial killer brothers found serial killer girlfriends” plotline, but fine. At least Rose is bad at it. Her first attempt at taking down a guy twice her size ends with her nearly dying, which is a lot more realistic than Sloane and Lark’s ridiculous escapades. Honestly, I loved that Rose wasn’t another “crafty” serial killer setting up eyeball puzzles or making sculptures out of intestines.
That said, I do like that all the serial killers have backstories and that they’re all pursuing vigilante justice. I can’t decide if I dislike how gimmicky it feels or if I’m fine with it because these books are meant to be lighthearted fun. They establish a baseline and call out important issues without making the whole book about them, which I can appreciate.
Then there’s Fionn. Heartbroken, rage-filled Fionn, hiding out in middle-of-nowhere Nebraska. He starts out as a crochet club member, joins a fight club, and then somehow becomes a mafia doctor. SURE. That’s character development. Out of all three couples, Rose and Fionn feel like they have the most depth.
But like… man. Where’s the yearning? The pining? The will-they-won’t-they? WHERE IS IT?! I get that this is a romcom, but from the get-go, they’re ready to jump on each other. Instead of wanting them to overcome their differences, you’re just annoyed waiting for them to finally do it. And yes, the explicit scenes are there (unexpected food items included, of course)—but sure. In B&B, I was waiting to see how Rowan would convince Sloane to open up. In L&L, I was wondering how they’d overcome their initial bad encounter. But in Scythe and Sparrow? They were into each other from the start, so where’s the tension?
And the rest? Just kind of okay. The plot doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, but it doesn’t need to. The problem is that when the romance is mid—and it’s supposed to be the focus—the plot being subpar makes it extra disappointing.
The pacing was fine, and the story progressed as expected, but I did find myself skimming a few chapters—especially the Suture Sisters plotline, which felt like filler content.
The choices the characters make? Wild. I love Rose’s impulsivity, but Fionn is supposed to be the level-headed one. Why the hell would he call Leander instead of Lachlan at the end? It’s literally Lachlan’s job. You could say it’s because he doesn’t want to burden his brother, but that’s a weak justification at best. Outside of “plot convenience,” there’s no solid reason.
One thing I did love? The layered timeline. Seeing events from the first two books through Rose and Fionn’s perspective was a great touch, and their year-long separation felt realistic and grounded.
What I didn’t love? The epilogue. HOW COME THIS ISN’T OVER?! I’m sorry, but three brothers, three wives, all six of them are serial killers? That’s a perfect ending. The fact that a random new girl was thrown in feels like a cash grab, and I am not here for it.
There are some genuinely funny moments, but they’re mostly in the dialogue rather than the obvious comedic setups. I didn’t care for the Suture Sisters plotline or Barbara the raccoon—they felt like cheesy plot devices. But I did love Fionn’s deadpan one-liners, like “Why are you at a car wash? You don’t have a car.” The humor was there, and I did smile a few times.
Overall, I’d recommend this if you’re not looking for anything groundbreaking—just some spice with characters you’ve already gotten to know from previous books. Other than trying to get this review out quickly, this wouldn’t have been an immediate read for me.
This was an okay time. I wish the romance had been built up better, especially since the plot and humor weren’t strong enough to carry the book. The spicy scenes were well-written, but at this point, they’re so frequent that if they’re not placed well, they just feel… medium.
I won’t be reading the next book because this series should have ended here. But I’d absolutely give the author’s next series a shot.
“Hell, I’ve already endured the ice cream and pizza, I might as well keep going” …
Brynne Weaver, Scythe & Sparrow
Did you read Scythe and Sparrow? What did you think? Let me know in the comments!
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