Talking Scared

Send us a textI’m on a break – but couldn’t resist releasing something.  Especially on today of all days, when lovers of democracy require audio sustenance whilst they wait in line to preserve America. For the first From the Vault episode, I’ve gone back to December of 2020, for an interview with Michael Marshall Smith. We talk about his 30 years of writing horror, fantasy, science fiction and assorted dark imaginings – captured in his career-spanning Best Of collection. Michael gives us all the good stuff about where ideas came from, why he writes the way he does, and all those details that literary voyeurs like us, want to know. It’s also a trip back into the weirdness of the pandemic, and the dying days of the Trump presidency. Have your trauma shields up just in case. Support the show

Send us a textHalloween has finally arrived. I’m marking it in grim, macabre style. For this Off Book Samhain Special, I’m joined by Kaelyn Moore, host and creator of Heart Starts Pounding – a podcast for the darkly curious, which offers up a new true-story of horror, hauntings and mystery every week. Kaelyn is a treasure trove of haunted anecdote and freaky facts. We only touch the tip of her knowledge in this conversation, but still manage to cover the grimmest deaths at Disneyland, a South American Nazi cult, the most cursed book in history and Kaelyn’s own family history with an early American serial killer. All that, plus a lot of recommendations for movies and the gruesome true-crime reading. Stick around for the afterword, and plenty of updates on the future of Talking Scared, Enjoy! Happy Halloween.  Books mentioned: The Man From the Train: The Solving of a Century-Old Serial Killer Mystery (2017), by Bill James and Rachel McCarthy JamesThe Butchering Art: Joseph Lister’s Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine (2017), by Lindsey FitzharrisI’ll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer (2018), by Michelle McNamaraThe Devil’s Rooming House: the True Story of America’s Deadliest Female Serial Killer (2011), by M. William Phelps  Support Talking Scared on Patreon Come talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to [email protected] Support the show

Send us a textThings are heating up as we approach Halloween. I’m joined by a good friend of Talking Scared – Rachel Harrison – to talk about the hot kind of immortality Her new novel, So Thirsty, does much more than that though. It weighs the weaponization of beauty culture, it asks how women can navigate a world in which youth seems to be everything, and it illustrates the sheer social awkwardness of immortality. Plus – it prompts a frank reckoning with just how badly I would cope in an orgy.  This is a fun episode, a deep episode, the perfect kind of bookish sign off for a few weeks whilst I take a break. And maybe a good hour of respite from the manic news cycle. Enjoy. Other books mentioned:The Return (2020), by Rachel HarrisonCackle (2021), by Rachel HarrisonSuch Sharp Teeth (2022), by Rachel HarrisonBlack Sheep (2023), by Rachel HarrisonNestlings (2023), by Nat CassidyReluctant Immortals (2022), by Gwendolyne KisteThe Militia House (2023), by John MilasThe Unsuitable (2020), by Molly Pohlig Support Talking Scared on Patreon Come talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to [email protected] Support the show

Send us a textAs we gear up for Halloween, we get all gussied up in Gothic. Del Sandeen joins me to talk about the curses, colorism, and all the many influences in her Southern Gothic debut This Cursed House. It’s a novel that twists the sub-genre’s typical reliance on race, for a more subtle, pernicious form of prejudice.  But it’s also chock full of all the haunted house–cursed family–secret rooms–and weird incest that you could want from a truly Gothic novel. It’s a damn good time, as is this conversation. We talk about New Orleans hauntings, the inspiration of Del’s grandmother, forgiveness as a theme, and the relative ickiness of incest. Consider this your starting gun for spooky season. Enjoy. Other books mentioned: Voodoo Dreams (1993), by Jewel Parker RhodesThe Good House (2003), by Tananarive DueBeloved (1987), by Toni MorrisonThe Vanishing Half (2020), by Brit BennettSing, Unburied Sing (2017) , by Jesymn WardWhen the Reckoning Comes (2021), by LaTanya McQueen“A Rose For Emily,” (1930), by William Faulkner“Jordan’s End,” in The Shadowy Third (1923), by Ellen GlasgowThe Elementals (1981), by Michael McDowellThe Conjure Woman (1899), by Charles W. ChesnuttThe House Behind the Cedars (1900), by Charles W. Chesnutt Support Talking Scared on Patreon Come talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to [email protected]   Support the show