Psycho Killers in Love is a novel that takes place in the United States Of Monsters universe by C.T. Phipps. It is a Prequel to the other series, taking place against the backdrop of the 2000 election and before The Reveal that led to the Broken Masquerade that defines the other books.
William Patrick is the son of infamous serial killer, Billy the Undying, and has inherited his dark powers as a slasher. So has his energetic Stephen King-loving sister, Carrie. Escaping from a mental institution, the pair attempt to find sanctuary only to find themselves hauted by the ghost of their dead father.
Along the way, they encounter a slasher hunter calling herself Nancy Loomis. Determined to kill William and Carrie, she finds herself changing her opinion as she finds a cult slaughtering young women for sport.
Can the two sides team up? Will love bloom?
This book contains the following tropes:
- Abusive Parents: In addition to his trying to raise his children as slashers, Billy verbally insults them (even post-mortem) and is referred to have physically abused them as well.
- Action Survivor: All of the women of TAA sorority are this except for Nancy and Sunshine. As well as Cassie, who is The Mole.
- Affectionate Parody: This is an homage to 80s slasher movies and the horror genre as a whole.
- Affably Evil:
- Both of the Patrick siblings are this if you don't subscribe to Blue-and-Orange Morality.
- The Spirit of the Hunt a.k.a Bloody Mary is friendly even as she supports slashers globally.
- Marge is friendly to the antiheroes despite running a cannibal diner.
- Ancient Conspiracy: Subverted. The Fraternity of Orion was founded in the 70s.
- Ancient Tradition: Another subverted example. Nancy's family of Action Girl Hunter of Monsters types is about three generations long.
- Antihero: Every single one of the protagonists. Even Nancy is willing to make a lot of moral compromises to save her friends.
- Aristocrats Are Evil: The Fraternity of Orion is a bunch of mega-rich hunters who murder innocents for sport.
- Bad People Abuse Animals: Subverted with the Patrick siblings who are Heroes Love Dogs (or antiheroes) but played straight with their father.
- Battle Couple: William and Nancy evolve into one of these over the course of the book.
- Beauty, Brains, and Brawn: Subverted as all three of them look like (Nancy beauty, William brains, and Carrie as their brain). In fact, all three of them have elements of both.
- Big Brother Instinct: William has a lot of this for his sister Carrie. She takes it in good grace.
- Big Damn Heroes: Nancy has a habit of coming to William's rescue.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Humorously played with as William is the blond.
- Blue-and-Orange Morality: Implied to be the case with William and Carrie. They're not evil like the rest of their family but they're removed from most standards of conventional morality.
- Expy:
- It's implied that all slasher movies are based on folklore that is based on real criminals and monsters (citing Ed Gein for Psycho and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre plus the The Town That Dreaded Sundown as an example). It's stated that "Fred", "Mike", and "The Camp Killer" are all real. Mentions are also made of the Supermarket Guy and the Miami Butcher too. They aren't the actual fictional characters but their inspirations.
- Subverted with Billy Patrick. While he's implied to be the inspiration for the killer in Black Christmas (1974) and Silent Night, Deadly Night, he is his own unique character with many elements of Freddy Krueger.
- Brother–Sister Team: William and Carrie are this despite the former's reluctance.
- Deconstructed Trope: Running away as fast as you can is lampshaded as actually a terrible strategy in an isolated location since doing an Ominous Walk actually will allow you to catch up faster than trying to match speeds.
- Final Girl: This is apparently the function of an Artemis as they are women who are empowered to kill slashers.
- Good Counterpart: Artemises serve as this to slashers, hunting monsters instead of humans. They're actually the same species. Slashers are just the same primordial Hunter of Monsters types corrupted by the Spirit of Murder.
- Grand Theft Me: Billy's plan for his son William. He plans to go into his dreams and steal his body. It's frustrated by the fact William barely sleeps and is a slasher in his own right.
- Hillbilly Horrors: Subverted with the Patrick family who are rural American serial killers. Both William and Carrie are self-educated but Wicked Cultured with a knowledge of Greek mythology as well as university-level education.
- Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday: Commented on as a favorite thing of Billy's. Parodied in that part of the book takes place during the 2000 Presidential Election.
- Hunting the Most Dangerous Game:
- The Fraternity of Orion's M.O. They specialize in Final Girl types.
- This is the M.O. of all slashes as they are driven by the Spirit of the Hunt. Actually, it's the Spirit of Murder.
- I Am a Humanitarian: Marge kills people and serves them up at the Last Stop Diner. Only William is disgusted by this.
- Implacable Man: Slashers and Artemises are both capable of shrugging off most attacks.
- Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: The mentions of various slashers through Expy stand-ins. This includes Freddy, Jason, Michael Meyers, and a teddy bear version of Chucky.
- Monster Misogyny: Very common among slashers.
- Billy is guilty of this his entire career. He's one of the Fraternity of Orion's founders
- The Fraternity of Orion practices this as well, primarily hunting women during their games.
- Monster/Slayer Romance: William is a slasher (immortal serial killer) that is struggling against his urges to kill while Nancy is an "Artemis", a Final Girl who is empowered to kill slashers. They manage to make it worse despite the odds.
- Nephilim: The slashers of this universe turn out to be this. Apparently, the first slashers were the descendants of angels and humans that hunted monsters for humanity. They were then corrupted by a demon, the Spirit of Murder, and gradually became enemies of mankind.
- Police Are Useless: justified in that the Fraternity of Orion is Fiction 500 rich and two of our protagonists are escaped mental patients.
- Resurrective Immortality: Powerful slashers possess this. So does Nancy.
- Serial-Killer Killer: Both William and Carrie have this as their slasher power manifestation. William hunts murderers while Carrie hunts abusive men (whether or women, children, or animals).
- Our Slashers Are Different: The basis of the book is slashers are a monster type among things like vampires, werewolves, and other creatures. They possess Resurrective Immortality, a Healing Factor, Super-Strength, and grow stronger with people telling urban legends about them. They can also sense their type of prey and are compelled to hunt them.
- Slasher Movie: It is a parody of these sorts of films.
- Slashers Prefer Blondes: Averted in the fact that Nancy is an Artemis with raven black hair.
- Shout-Out: As befitting a C.T. Phipps novel there's references to dozens of slasher movies, Stephen King, Star Wars, and more.
- The Stoic: William displays very little in the way of emotions. It actually renders him immune to his father's mindcontrol.
- Take That!: Several pointed political references.
- The Bush family is stated to be part of the extended Patrick clan of Hillbilly Horrors cannibals.
- The Cassidy Brothers are one long extended one to the Koch Brothers.
- OJ Simpson and Jeffrey Epstein are stated to be part of the Fraternity of Orion Monster Misogyny cult.
- Olive Garden through Demeter's Garden where the food is terrible and atmosphere painfully generic.
- Unfortunate Names:
- Carrie names her mini-pitbull "Cujo." Justified as she's a Stephen King fangirl and not likely to think it bad luck given she's a slasher. Nancy, however, thinks its inviting bad luck given what happens to the dog in the novel. Cujo ends up becoming an undead horror at the end, but still friendly.
- The Theta Alpha Alpha sorority is for survivors of violence, Final Girl types, and self-defense. Carrie says their name could be T&A. Nancy comments that now she can't unsee it.
- Voice with an Internet Connection: Most of the characters thanks to the Psychic Powers that come with being a slasher or Artemis. They're all connected to the Spirit of the Hunt that tends to try to push them to killing people in order to alleviate its boredom.
