Love and Other Killers - Bonus Episode

Buckle up - today we discuss the Love & Other Killers novella by Brynne Weaver and our theories for Harvest Season. 

Spoilers Ahead 

Live Laugh Mortal Trash

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:06

Welcome, Smut Squad, to a special bonus episode. Bonus. We are your hosts, Charlie and Danielle. We are continuing with the month of Bryn, and that Bryn is Bryn Weaver. And today we're going to be talking about Love and Other Killers slash theories and crossovers and everything that we think is going to be happening with um tourist season and the new upcoming book, Harvest Season, and the third book, which we don't have a name for. So super quick. Love and Other Killers is a novella. It's 60 pages. You can read this book. You could read it in one sitting. You could read it in four days. You can read it super, super quick because it takes absolutely no time. Basically, Love and Other Killers is Brynn's love letter to her fans. This is the love letter. Like this is the thank you, the tip of the hat, the thanks for sticking around for all of the fans of the Ruinous Love trilogy. Basically, we have our annual August showdown, except this year, instead of it just being Sloan and Rowan, it is all the fam. So we have got Rowan, Lachlan, Fion, and we have got their ladies Sloan, Lark, and Rose. They are all going to be participating in this year's showdown, and it's going to be the girls versus the guys. I love that. Which is honestly, it's so much fun. Yeah. And it's really cute because we get to see kind of how their relationships have progressed. Like we get to see their cute little like banter between all of them, but also how their friendships, because obviously, like Lark and Sloan were buddies, but Rose, you know, was kind of their new to the group friend. And so it's really cute to see them like all getting along. They're all partying. This is where we get our very famous Rowan using the poster paint to bring Sloane's cosplay fantasy to life where he dresses up as like Zidane.

SPEAKER_01 2:11

One of my favorite things I've ever read in a book in my life. Like he's fucking eaten poster paint.

SPEAKER_00 2:17

He's eating poster paint. Fucking idiot. Like, but also he can't get it off. And it just, it's so cute because, like, honestly, I love this book. I really like novellas, and especially a novella like this, where it is just a special sweet treat. It's not something that you need to read in between. It's not because a lot of times with novellas, like if it's in the middle of like a series, you're kind of like, Why did we do this? What was the point of that? You know, and you need to read it to continue. But one where it's like, here's a gift. This is a gift for you.

SPEAKER_01 2:47

This is a gift for me. Just for me.

SPEAKER_00 2:49

Yes, absolutely love. Um, and they're all kind of like roasting Rowan for using this like poster paint, idiot. The girls have determined who they think that the killer is, they're scoping it out, and yada yada yada. There's some murder. We get a rose line where she shouts, um, what is it? The choice fucking shouts. Motherfucker, like watching. Motherfucker. Yeah, like I can't remember what the fuck it is that she always fucking shouts. Ta-da! Motherfucker. Ta-da, motherfucker. That's what it is. Ta-da, motherfucker, when she like jumps out. We get a lot of like Rose throwing up because she's a fucking baby. Anyways, kill, kill, kill. Now, the reason why we're here today. The real important stuff. While they are doing this scoping of this murder house, there is a random girl who comes across their path on the way to the farmhouse, and it is autumn. This is the one that they found in the cellar of Harvey Mead's house. And now, spoil, spoil, spoil, spoil. If you haven't listened to Tourist Season, if you haven't read Tourist Season, stop right now because we don't want to spoil this for you.

SPEAKER_01 4:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 4:03

If you're still here, okay. Autumn is Harper. So now we're gonna talk theories. I think that in the next book, and if not in the next book, because we haven't read it, I don't know, it's coming out June 9th. Check back and see if we're right or not. Um, or if it's not in that book, in book three, I think that Autumn is going to need to ask for help from the team from the fam in the book.

SPEAKER_01 4:36

I think so too. I actually a hundred percent agree with you on this. I feel like the gang is going to end up on Cape Carnage for probably another showdown of some sort. Yeah. Yeah, so whether it's just Sloan and Rowan, yeah, or we get like a Love Another Killers kind of thing where like all six of them end up in Cape Carnage. Oh my god, yeah. And I think we're gonna have like a little cute crossover situation where Harper Autumn is going to find herself in deep shit with the sheriff.

SPEAKER_00 5:11

And she's gonna need some help. Which pull up by the way guns. We learned at the very end of tourist season is LaPlume, the serial killer, which totally makes sense because they could do an annual August showdown and then be tracking LaPlume, which also they could be accidentally thinking that it might be Arthur because he's also on that place killing people, taking out sometimes not the most deserving of tourists. So maybe they do think that he's just like a naughty naughty like serial killer rather than like a serial killer like them that kills bad guys. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 5:55

Is that oh my god, wait. Okay, that's so smart. Like, do you think that they're gonna be there to hunt Arthur? Yes. And then they're gonna be like, whoa, this is our girl. Oh yes, if that doesn't happen, I'm gonna be so upset. I'm gonna be so upset.

SPEAKER_00 6:13

And we we have got the perfect like plot for you. Have them there to hunt Arthur, like, because also the thing is Arthur, people mistakenly think that Arthur might be LaPlume, right? So they are hunting. Like, I don't know if the world is aware, like, yo, hey, Cape Carnage has because Arthur's got like a kill count of at least 16. LaPlume's got a kill count. We also have the Nolan is killing people. He's killed, I think, at least three people so far to get this like, you know, retribution.

SPEAKER_01 6:51

100% on their radar.

SPEAKER_00 6:53

A lot of people that are killing, like, we're talking lots of digits here, you know, among all of these different serial killers, as well as Harper has been helping kill people. So really untold amounts, and they're gonna get this like, hey, you know, for next year's annual August showdown, there is this town where this shit is happening. Somebody should go take care of this because again, some of these people are killing like tourists that are just doing naughty-naughty stuff, but you might not be able to find like a criminal record on them. So these would be exactly who the Ruinous Love trilogy would hunt. And I could see them potentially showing up to hunt, like mistakenly, Arthur, and then be like, holy shit, there's Autumn. That's that chick. Or her needing help, reaching out to them and them showing up to help her take care of La Plume.

SPEAKER_01 7:53

I also feel like Rose is in the circus, the traveling circus. And I feel like that could also be a way that we all wind up there.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

Because remember at the very end of Scythe and Sparrow, she ended up at a cape. I can't remember the exact cape, but where she received the final tarot card, it was somewhere like some kind of like islandy with a lighthouse kind of situation. She may have ended up at the Cape.

SPEAKER_01 8:21

Oh it's all coming together now. That's true, because it was like on a cliff. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

There was like a ceiling's curse. Did someone drive off a soapbox car with pink tassel? Like, yeah, yeah. Yeah, maybe it potenti honestly, all of this could connect together. Either way, I really, really want it to. I also, because I'm insane, really want her to connect a shadow in the reaping.

SPEAKER_01 8:50

But I know that the vampire. The vampire siren who's Yeah, that's 100% connected.

SPEAKER_00 8:57

I know that's impossible, but it would make me very happy.

SPEAKER_01 9:03

Um, I also really feel like all of our animals in this need to be united somehow in some way.

SPEAKER_00 9:11

Um a bird, a raccoon, a cat, a dog. I'll walk into Cape Carnage and Anamorphs.

SPEAKER_01 9:20

Yes. Anamorphs. Animorphs. That's what I want. It's actually for all of the main female characters to anamorph into their animals. Wow. And then I want them to go and fight crime.

SPEAKER_00 9:33

I think my vampire siren thing has a much better chance of happening than your thing, but come see, come sa. We'll see what happens. We'll see what happens. All I know is that it's gonna be incredible, and that we have literally been waiting because when did we read this for the first time? It was like when it came out in September, I believe. So we have been, this has been a long ten months. Could we also touch on Lucas? Yes.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

Arthur's grandson. Are we sure he's a good guy?

SPEAKER_00 10:13

Ooh. He has got the makings to be a bad guy. His mom died, and everyone thinks that Arthur did it. Ooh, but also I always thought that it was really weird that he bought the distillery where his mom was murdered. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 10:34

The leader of the sleuth seekers, and he hides behind his keyboard. He could oh my god, I didn't up until this exact moment. But now I'm like Do you think he was like the Autobots rollout message sender?

SPEAKER_00 10:50

He could have been, right? Where he was like, hey, he hasn't checked in. Because also, like, he owns this distillery. You're telling me he has this place and he's like fully renovating it and he's doing all this work and he doesn't have any cameras, he doesn't have any systems, he doesn't know if there's like wayward teenagers that are coming in here and like trashing the bitch. That is a very good theory because also when Harper kind of like discusses Lucas, he's just kind of the brother, he's off, you know, like the brother-ish, like she treats him and he's just kind of off doing his own thing, and she kind of like is feel finds him very unassuming, which that's also how we thought about the sheriff. And look at what happened there. Like, look at what happened there.

SPEAKER_01 11:36

Yeah, he's gonna be.

SPEAKER_00 11:37

Because he's got a really good diligent origin story, like he totally could be a bad guy. And oh my god, that'd be so great if there was like even more bad guys. Like, how many bad guys? Well, and also because he sold off the property that was Arthur's kill zone, you know, where he was like hiding the bodies and whatever else, and he never like had a little chat with his grandpa about like, hey, I'm selling off this one piece of land. He just went and did it. Really? That's true. You wouldn't discuss it with him. Why would he sell that piece of land out of all the lands? Like, yeah, maybe it's a little quinky dank, maybe, maybe, maybe, but also maybe he wanted him to get caught, but he didn't want, you know, like maybe he wanted to see what Harper would do. Maybe he's compiling a whole thing. I think Lucas might be bad. Lucas might be a backup. I think so.

SPEAKER_01 12:34

Huh. Yeah, I could see that. I absolutely love it. Um, also, what was our innkeeper hotel sleepy on the job lady? What was her name? Do we remember? Um I should remember.

SPEAKER_00 12:48

Like I literally just read this book again. I know, and I wrote it down, whatever the hell we're gonna call her.

SPEAKER_01 12:55

So I think that there's gonna be something that involves her. Okay, but I don't think it's gonna be like necessarily bad. I feel like there's gonna be like a a situation with her, though. Because I don't think we're done with her. She's just given out people's information and she knows everything. She knows about everything.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

She's about everybody. Yes. She knows, she knows some shit. 100%. Yeah, I could totally see her doing like something. I think that so basically book one, I think that tourist season was kind of our setting the stage. Here's who the major players are, and I think that book two, we're going to get a lot more in-depth. I'm really hoping that we get a lot more of Harper's background um story in harvest season. I'm really hoping that if we get at the very end, okay, we're gonna throw this out for a romanticy girlies, but if we get Crescent City 2 at the very end, the last chapter, if we get fucking crossover like that, I will literally lay an egg. I will absolutely die. I am so envious of everybody who has the arc of this book right now because I have just been spinning with these theories in my head for such a long time. Um is on. Oh, the countdown is on. We are so close. We are so close, and especially doing a reread of this was such a bad idea because it started the clock all over again for me. I was like, you know, in September, I was like mad. I needed to know what happened right away, and then I kind of like forgot, and I read Ruinous Love Trilogy and I let it go, and I was like able to live my life, and I was happy again. And then when I started reading this book again, I was like, why did I do this to myself? Now I need to know again, and I know that she is going to have this like great book, and then three, four chapters before the end, she's gonna drop some bombs, and then she's just gonna smoke bomb out of there, and then CNER for the next book, and then I'm just gonna be lost all over again.

SPEAKER_01 15:17

Yeah, and the funny thing is I sign up for it every time. Um the funny thing about tourist season is there was really no food spoiling in it. No, which is wild. Yeah. Like if anything, you've opposited it with me with mushroom sauce for my hot chocolate.

SPEAKER_00 15:44

That seems like a great time. Like it seems like I want to drink hot chocolate in the rain while digging up bodies.

SPEAKER_01 15:50

I don't want to do any of that except drink the hot chocolate. But do you think like what is gonna be the thing for this trilogy? Was there something that already happened and we're just not picking it up?

SPEAKER_00 16:02

I just haven't picked up until the next book? I don't know, right? Because in um the Ruinous Love trilogy, it is eyeballs, eyeballs, eyeballs. Like she hit us with eyeballs all the time, you know, and obviously food. She hit us with food a lot too, but it was like very, very Bryn coded. If you read those books, if you presented those books separately to people with no covers and no like background, whatever, you would know that they were written by Bryn Weaver. Like even if you changed names and whatever, you would pick up on it. But this one really, even though it's written by her, and we still get a lot of her like silly little jokes and like a Bryn type characters, it feels like a totally different series. Which again, if you have read Shadow in the Reaping, she also did it with that. It's very different, which again, like you can feel Bryn's writing in it, you get the like jokes and the stuff that you have come to expect and love from Bryn, but it is very, very different. And the first book, so Tura Season, I say is a baby between I Know What You Did Last Summer and Hot Fuzz, and it's like those two had a baby and they made Tura season. So that was the outcome. Yeah, I'm really curious to see what happens with harvest season. Like, because you're right, because there will be something, and she may have already been even doing it. Maybe it's just the ooey-gooey, chewy like gore that the raven has been eating. Like it could be that. It could be that. It could be like that kind of, you know, like maybe Barbara shows up and she also likes to partake in flesh. Like, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

Um, I like all the pets are also cannibals, but not really cannibals because they're not eating animals. What would that be? Just hungry?

SPEAKER_00 18:00

Just hungry, hungry, hungry hippos, just super hungry, and nothing will do except for human flesh.

SPEAKER_01 18:08

Except for human flesh. Okay, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:10

Like it could be that. I don't know. But I also, yeah, like I don't know. I'm just super excited.

SPEAKER_01 18:19

I have very high hopes for harvest season.

SPEAKER_00 18:23

I know. And I know that it's gonna be absolutely fabulous, and that I and I know that at the end I'm gonna need to just like sit in the rain and process for seven to eight business days because I know there's gonna be a cliffhanger that's just gonna frickin' absolutely ruin.

SPEAKER_01 18:41

Yeah. Also, if Arthur dies, oh I'm gonna be pissed. Oh, why'd you say that? Because now I feel like it's gonna happen. I feel like he's gonna die.

SPEAKER_00 18:52

Somebody has she Somebody has to die. The thing is, she has not killed somebody in a series in a while. Because all of Ruinous Love, remember, is an interconnected standalone. But if you think in the Way Way Back Machine to Shadow and the Reaping, she does take out some important players because it is a trilogy, and this is a trilogy. I think we go and lose someone important. Maybe it'll be Lucas, maybe he's not a bad guy, maybe he'll sacrifice. I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 19:24

I wouldn't be sad about that though.

SPEAKER_00 19:27

No, not at this point, especially because now I believe that he's bad. Yeah, I also believe that he's bad. So thanks for putting that in my brain. What if Arthur dies? Girl, why are you doing this to me? I can't. I can't stop thinking about it now. Now it's in your brain, just squatting on it like an octopus, you fucking idiot. Yeah. Well, I think that wraps it up for our theories. Do you have any more theories? That's it. That's all I've got for you. That's it. If you would like to discuss these theories with us in person, we are going to be at a harvest season release party Tuesday, June 9th, presented by Rocky Mountain Book Box. Um, we're gonna be celebrating the new release. We're going to be recapping tourist season. There's gonna be theories, we're gonna play a mystery game, there's gonna be snacks, and then we're gonna hit the road and read our books. That's going to be happening from 5.30 p.m. till 7.30 p.m. at the Blend Hinton, Alberta. That's Tuesday, June 9th, 2026. Uh, there are tickets still available at Rocky Mountainbookbox.ca. And even more excited! Monday, June 6th, 5.30 p.m. at the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge in Jasper, Alberta. Rocky Mountain Book Box presents Bryn Weaver in conversation with Aurora Pallet. That is right. Yes. There is going to be a QA. There's going to be an author discussion. There's going to be vendor shopping. There's going to be photo ops. I'm going to drop to my knees and kiss Bryn's feet because I love her so much. I I might cry. I am going to hold you to that. I don't want to cry, but I feel like I might get so excited that I might hyperventilate. I'm for sure gonna say weird shit to her. I know for sure I'm gonna be like wet ass pussy, shadow of the reaping, and then just like smack my face into the wall and just leave.

SPEAKER_01 21:33

Like you should learn how to do like a jumping and like land in the splits with Jamma's hands just for I think she would like to see this.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

I can't do the splits. That's it's a blown.

SPEAKER_01 21:44

Girl, you got time.

SPEAKER_00 21:45

Okay, I have a month to figure out how to do the splits, but I will try. So that again, that's May's. Nope, May. No. That is July. So that is coming up right away. There are Very limited tickets available. To get those tickets, go to Rocky Mountain Bookbookbox.ca, Lego Towns, all one word. They're being sold on Eventbrite, but you can find out all the details there. And again, check out everything that we have been up to for the month of Bryn on our Insta. We have got pictures, we have got little skits that we were doing. We dressed up as some of our fan favorites. We just, we've been busy. We've been doing weird stuff in the woods. Come check it out. Weird stuff in the woods. And if you have any books, authors, events you would like us to be part of, we're looking for another, like just fun books to cover because like we have our favorites, but we'll talk to you about Butcher and Blackbird until you die. So, like, what are your favorites? Um and if you have anything like that, email us at smutsyndicate at gmail.com. You can also use the text feature in the show notes and hit us up on all the socials. Thanks, guys, for listening. Live laugh moral trash.