Jennifer Hillier’s The Butcher is set against the backdrop of a real-world panic that gripped the Pacific Northwest in the 1970s and 1980s, when the region became infamous as a hunting ground for serial killers. High-profile murderers like Ted Bundy, who preyed on young women across Washington and Oregon in the mid-1970s, Randall Woodfield, known as the I-5 Killer, who sexually assaulted and murdered at least 10 victims along the I-5 corridor, and the Green River Killer (Gary Ridgway), who was responsible for at least 49 murders in the Seattle area beginning in the early 1980s, created a climate of intense public fear. Killers like these created both panic, which resulted in curfews and intense public scrutiny, and pressure on law enforcement.

Recent scholarship around the spate of serial killers based in the region offers varied explanations for the phenomenon, including geography and environmental concerns. Caroline Fraser’s 2025 book, Murderland: Crime and Bloodlust in the Time of Serial Killers, posits that the phenomenon is the result of industrial pollution. In support of this theory, The Harvard Gazette points out, “Ted Bundy, whose crimes and background are discussed more than any other character, grew up in the shadows of the ASARCO copper smelter in Tacoma, Washington.