Biblically accurate spree killer. Twenty years ago, sixteen-year-old Walker James Peck donned his mask and claimed thirteen lives as the Button Eyes Bastard. After ten days of brutality, he turned himself in, covered in his mother's blood, with his boyfriend's corpse in the passenger seat. Now, weeks before his lethal injection date, true crime podcaster Lydia Krause, self-proclaimed "hostess with the rigor mostest" sits down with him to uncover the truth of the man behind the massacre. Walker wants to finally tell his story, but Lydia is more interested in how many sponsorships she'll get. As Walker struggles to recount his killings and grapples with a warped view of religion forced onto him by his upbringing, Lydia is dazzled by her newfound stardom and emboldened to make the most inappropriate jokes possible in the name of clout. Lydia's years-long fascination with the case only grows as Walker dives deeper into his story, realizing that what she'd seen in the poorly researched film adaptation wasn't all true. She becomes more impassioned as she tries to balance her true feelings over the case with her ditzy Internet persona, while Walker barrels toward the big reveal with guns, handsaws, and bleach jugs a-blazing.

Publication Year: 2023