A review by roksyreads
The Mercenary and the Mortician by Alexandra St Pierre

adventurous dark emotional funny sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

The Mercenary and the Mortician is my first Alexandra St Pierre novel. That I would happily have read more after 770* pages—and after devouring 484 of those pages in a single day—speaks to how thoroughly I enjoyed this story! It was the perfect blend of action, thriller, suspense, and romance, with a dash of the paranormal and an incredible cast of main and supporting characters. As part of the Silent Hollow duology** it was an extra treat to have MMCs Ronan, Logan, and Dakota from Alina May’s novel Make Me pop into this story and bring their banter with them, adding a little extra dark humour to the novel.

I loved getting to know MMCs Ryan and Cal from their first tense meeting through to their HEA. I really appreciated how much thought and depth was put into their experiences and their individual journeys, and the chemistry between them was off the charts, making for a romance that was both incredibly sweet, deliciously angsty, and ultra spicy. I finished the novel truly feeling like I knew them as people, not just as characters in a book. I can never adequately put it into words, but it’s such a wonderful experience as a reader when you leave a piece of your heart with a book and that little shard is filled in with an impression of that story. I can’t wait to dive into more of Alexandra’s novels because I’m confident I’ve found a new auto-buy author. 

Ratings:
5⭐   ~   4🌶️   ~   4💔

Tropes:

🖤 Hurt/comfort

🖤 Morally grey MC

🖤 Stalk𝚎r

🖤 Opposites attract (serious/sunshine)

🖤 Touch him and 💀

🖤 Found family

🖤 Praise~

🖤 “Good boy”

What I loved:

🖤 Queer joy

🖤 Dark humour

🖤 Morally complex characters

🖤 All the angst

🖤 Stunning character/scene art in both the eBook and physical editions

~

*770 is the page count for the eBook edition. The physical edition which has since arrived is 519 pages which is still a gorgeous brick of a book 😉

**Whilst The Mercenary and the Mortician and Make Me are technically standalone stories, if you’d like to read both I’d recommend starting with The Mercenary and the Mortician as the plot and some key events form the foundation for Make Me.