Matchmaking for Psychopaths Summary: Darkly Comic Thriller
TL;DR: A Matchmaker’s Double Life Unravels
Matchmaking for Psychopaths is a satirical psychological thriller about a matchmaker who specializes in psychopathic clients while hiding her own violent family history.
When her fiancé cheats on her, her life spirals into a sequence of murders, frame jobs, and dark romance.
Alexandra “Lexie” Smith is a Minneapolis matchmaker with an unusual specialty: pairing clients who score high on psychopathy metrics.
She also guards a secret—her real name is Alexandra Schwartz, and her parents were notorious serial killers.
In Matchmaking for Psychopaths by Tasha Coryell, Lexie’s carefully staged ordinary life unravels on her twenty-ninth birthday when her fiancé and best friend announce their affair.
What follows is a chain of events involving a charming pilot, a support group, and a series of gruesome deliveries.
The novel blends dark comedy with psychological suspense, following a woman who has spent years masking her past as she is pulled back toward the instincts she tried to bury.
- Genre: Dark comedy, psychological thriller, satirical domestic noir.
- Protagonist: Lexie Smith, a matchmaker with a serial-killer secret.
- Key dynamic: Lexie’s pull between a “normal” life and her inherited instincts.
- Core question: Can she keep up her facade, or will she embrace who she really is?
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Matchmaking for Psychopaths: Book Details
- Genre & Subgenre: Dark Comedy / Psychological Thriller / Satirical Domestic Noir
- Core Narrative Tropes: Unreliable Narrator, Serial Killer Next Door, Dark Secret / Frame Job, Twisted Soulmates, Workplace Rivalry
- Tone & Atmosphere: Satirical, darkly comedic, suspenseful, cynical, and chillingly casual
- Primary Conflict: Lexie’s internal struggle between wanting a normal romantic-comedy life and embracing her violent lineage, alongside external threats of exposure and deadly rivals
- Pacing Style: Fast-paced, episodic, first-person narrative with dramatic cliffhangers and escalating twists
- ISBN: 978-0593640302 (ISBN-13); 0593640306 (ISBN-10)
- Pages: 336
- Book Structure: 1 Prologue followed by 33 numbered chapters (34 main narrative sections)
Matchmaking for Psychopaths Summary: Full Spoilers Ahead
Spoiler warning: This section reveals the complete plot, including the ending.
Alexandra “Lexie” Smith works at Better Love, a Minneapolis matchmaking agency. She secretly matches clients who show psychopathic traits, using an intake questionnaire created by the agency’s founder, Serena.
Lexie also hides her real identity: she is Alexandra Schwartz, daughter of serial killers Peter and Lydia Schwartz.
When Lexie was ten, she orchestrated her parents’ arrest, framing her mother and leading to her father’s death in prison. On her twenty-ninth birthday, her fiancé, Dr. Noah, and her best friend, Molly, reveal they are in love.
Lexie drinks heavily, blacks out, and wakes up in a hot tub with Aidan, a private jet pilot, to whom she confesses her parents’ crimes.
Aidan later becomes a client at Better Love and demands Lexie as his matchmaker. He tells her he diagnosed himself as a psychopath at sixteen after killing a runner with a rock. Meanwhile, Lexie takes on a client named Rebecca Newsom, a luxury car salesperson, and develops a friendship with her.
Lexie discovers Rebecca attends a support group called Children of Murdered Parents (COMP). Lexie crashes a meeting, bonds with Rebecca, and attempts to win Noah back. Noah sleeps with her but remains distant, then disappears.
Gruesome deliveries begin arriving: a frozen human heart, then a foot and internal organs. Lexie realizes the parts belong to Noah and buries them in the winter woods to avoid police suspicion.
At work, Lexie competes with her rival Nicole for a promotion. The office is vandalized with mannequin limbs and the phrase “MATCHMAKING FOR PSYCHOPATHS.” Police question Lexie about Paul, a client who caused a scene after Rebecca rejected him.
On Valentine’s Day, Lexie is lured to the office. Nicole holds her at gunpoint while her husband, Ethan, pours gasoline outside. Nicole reveals she knows Lexie’s true identity and plans to kill her and frame her.
Aidan throws Ethan through a window, and Lexie shoots Nicole dead. Aidan shoots Ethan to stage a murder-suicide and flies Lexie away.
Lexie then retrieves Noah’s remains, breaks into Molly’s apartment, plants the body parts, rescues Molly’s cat, and sends an anonymous bomb threat. Police find the remains and arrest Molly for Noah’s murder.
A month later, Lexie and Aidan visit Lydia in prison. Lexie admits she framed her mother years ago, leaving Lydia screaming. Aidan proposes on his plane.
On their wedding day, Lexie finds Noah’s severed head in a gift box. Her maid of honor, Rebecca, reveals she is Lexie’s older half-sister—Lydia’s daughter from a first marriage.
Rebecca murdered Noah out of envy, kept his head frozen, and orchestrated the deliveries with Molly and Nicole. Lexie stabs Rebecca with a bagel knife. Aidan helps hide the body, finds Lexie a red dress, and they complete their wedding vows.
Lexie ends the story content with Aidan, noting their lives will be perfect as long as they do not kill too many people.
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Characters in Matchmaking for Psychopaths
| Character | Role |
|---|---|
| Alexandra “Lexie” Smith | Protagonist and first-person narrator; a Minneapolis matchmaker who specializes in psychopathic clients and hides her identity as the daughter of serial killers. |
| Aidan | A private jet pilot and Better Love client; a self-diagnosed psychopath who becomes Lexie’s partner and husband. |
| Dr. Noah | Lexie’s ex-fiancé, a medical resident who cheats with Molly and is later murdered by Rebecca. |
| Rebecca Newsom | Lexie’s client and secret older half-sister; a luxury car salesperson who murders Noah and targets Lexie. |
| Molly | Lexie’s former best friend who has an affair with Noah and is later framed for his murder. |
| Nicole | Lexie’s rival matchmaker at Better Love who uncovers Lexie’s past and attempts to kill her. |
| Ethan | Nicole’s husband who assists in the arson attempt at Better Love. |
| Serena | Founder and owner of Better Love; creator of the psychopathy-screening intake questionnaire. |
| Oliver | An LGBTQ+ specialist matchmaker at Better Love. |
| Lydia Schwartz | Lexie’s mother, an imprisoned serial killer serving a life sentence. |
| Peter Schwartz | Lexie’s late father and Lydia’s partner in serial murder. |
| Paul | A client at Better Love who becomes obsessed with Rebecca and causes a disturbance. |
| Felix | Molly’s cat, rescued by Lexie when she plants Noah’s body parts. |
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Quotes from Matchmaking for Psychopaths
“There were some estimates that as much as twenty-five percent of the population could be categorized as psychopaths.”
“Strangely, romantic comedies were the best kind of education, because they taught me that the pathway to love was rarely straight.”
“You’re not this good-girl housewife married to a doctor. You would’ve been bored within five minutes. That’s not the kind of love you want. You want passion, excitement. It’s what I want too.”
“You can justify almost any action as a matter of self-preservation if you try hard enough.”
“Fuck luck,” he said. “We have something better. We have love.”
“Our lives were going to be perfect. Perfect, that was, as long as we could keep ourselves from killing too many people.”
Books Like Matchmaking for Psychopaths
- My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite: A darkly comedic novel about a woman navigating family ties and cleaning up after a sister’s murders while maintaining a professional exterior.
- How to Kill Your Family by Bella Mackie: Features a cynical female narrator who methodically executes lethal plans while commenting on modern social aesthetics and upper-class hypocrisy.
- You by Caroline Kepnes: A satirical psychological thriller following an obsessive protagonist who rationalizes extreme behavior in the name of true love.
- Maeve Fly by CJ Leede: Centers on a woman living a dual life—normal by day, indulging psychopathic impulses by night.
- Love Letters to a Serial Killer by Tasha Coryell: Written by the same author, exploring true-crime obsession, dark romance, and female antiheroes.
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