Talking Scared

Send us a textI know it’s the middle of winter but this week the book in question is taking us back to summer. And not our current plague-summer – but the halcyon days of 1989. Think kids on bikes, running wild, fights and first loves, demonic deer gods … wait … what?Our guest, Wendy N. Wagner is the editor-in-chief of the prestigious Nightmare Magazine, and the author of epic coming-of-age horror The Deer Kings, as well as the ‘Sawmill Gothic’, The Secret Skin. We talk about both books and how Wendy has transposed both the classic British Gothic and the traditional New England small-town horror story to a Pacific Northwest setting.Bigfoot doesn’t even show his face.We talk about the fervid popularity of coming-of-age horror right now, we plumb the dark, seamy underbelly of rural Oregon, we compare notes on the small towns of our childhoods, and I have the temerity to ask Wendy the best way to get published in Nightmare. There is even doughnut chat. Enjoy!Books discussed in this episode include:  The Shadow Year (2008), by Jeffrey Ford IT, by Stephen King (1986) Boy’s Life, by Robert McCammon (1991) Summer of Night, by Dan Simmons (1991) Harvest Home (1973), by Thomas Tryon Friday Night Lights: A Town, a Team, and a Dream (1990), by H.G. Bissinger Support Talking Scared on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, and TikTok Or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textIf you are feeling depressed, what with OMICRON emerging like the worst villain in some direct-to-streaming video game adaptation, then do I have the tonic for you.Josh Malerman is back for his second bout of Talking Scared, only 6 months after he was last here. This time, more than ever, he brings joy, wonder, inspiration and a 700 page book that will work your triceps as well as your mind and soul.  Ghoul n’ the Cape is Josh’s magnum opus, so far. So far! It’s the truly epic tale of two men fleeing a unique evil across the entire landmass of the United States. It takes in politics, violence, spectacle, horror, friendship, a nation-eating star and a man made entirely of blood. This is not your average horror paperback.Therefore, it gives us plenty to talk about. The Great American Novel™ and the quest narrative amongst much more. But again, and again we come back to the crucial, pivotal role of awe and wonder in our lives. And we talk about how horror, of all things, can help us achieve that. Oh, and at one point I make Josh teary. Win!Enjoy!Books discussed in this episode include: Yours Cruelly, Elvira (2021), by Cassandra Peterson Pearl (2021), by Josh Malerman (previously published as The Day of the Pig) Visions of Kody (1972), by Jack Kerouac and Brice Matthieussent The Talisman (1984), by Peter Straub and Stephen King  Ghoul n’ the Cape is published in a limited run in December by Earthling Press. You can buy one of the remaining copies here.Support Talking Scared on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, and TikTok Or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textAnd now for something a little different.This is a show about scary stories and writing horror… but that doesn’t mean everything has to be on the page. Our guest this week is Richard Maclean Smith, host and producer of Unexplained Podcast, the best show out there on the creepy, mysterious and mystifying events that people like me spend hours reading about on Wikipedia. There is everything from true crime to strange disappearances, ghosts and demons, monsters and UFOs, as well as some more unique oddities, like a woman killed by the ‘little folk’ and a computer that may have communicated through time.God I love me some High Strangeness.Ok, I’ll throw you a bone, he also has a book to complement the podcast. That book – Unexplained: Real Life Supernatural Stories for Uncertain Times delves deeper into a selection of particularly weird events, whilst also giving Richard more room to expand beyond the mystery, into the areas of philosophy, psychology and humanism that really fascinates him. Cos that’s what set’s Unexplained apart – that reflection and interrogation of the human condition.We talk about all that, but I’m a mystery nerd, and I insist on simpler questions like, “what’s your favourite mystery” too, and we talk about vanishing hikers, cursed boxes and possessed murderers, as well as fear of the dark and dreams about Mikhail Gorbachev.    I’m always there for you listeners, ready to dumb it down.Enjoy!Follow the link for Richard’s horror fiction podcast, The Fountain Road FilesSupport the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com.Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textFor over three decades Ellen Datlow has been at the centre of the horror community. She is the queen of editors, the doyenne of anthologisers, the person who gets to declare what is the Best Horror of the Year.And she has come back to talk to me after I lost the conversation file the first time around…!That major mishap may have been a blessing in disguise, as since then she has published two standout anthologies, dealing with very different branches of horror. Body Shocks is a bumper collection of extremely nasty body horror; When It Gets Dark is a collection of stories inspired by the life and work of Shirley Jackson. One is icky, one is spooky, one makes you cringe, the other makes you shiver. And both are packed with stellar names. As well as discussing these anthologies, we talk about Ellen’s career in horror, how she does what she does, and what words like ‘horror’ and ‘scary’ mean to her. She talks about big names she worked with, and gives us some ideas on who the big names of tomorrow will be.Oh, and she also lets slip that she collects doll limbs … a perfect little nugget to season this mix.Enjoy. Body Shocks: Extreme Tales of Body Horror is out now from Tachyon PressWhen Things Gets Dark: Stories Inspired by Shirley Jackson is out now from Titan PressOther books mentioned in this episode include: “Shit Happens” (2018), by Michael Marshall Smith, in The Devil and the Deep: Horror Stories of the Sea, edited by Ellen Datlow Nothing but Blackened Teeth (2021), by Cassandra Khaw Flyaway (2020), by Kathleen Jennings The Only Good Indians (2020), by Stephen Graham Jones My Heart is a Chainsaw (2021), by Stephen Graham Jones And Then I Woke Up (2022), by Malcolm Devlin Echo (2022), by Thomas Olde Heuvelt The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Reporter (2022), by Daniela Tomova  Support the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com.Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textThis week I’m feeling warm and fuzzy (don’t worry it won’t last). Halloween is over, the weather has turned dark, we’ve all got the central heating on and are hunkering down for the end of the year. What better time for a slightly more cosy read?Our guest this week is Mark Stay, author, screenwriter, and one half of the quite wonderful Bestseller Experiment podcast. Usually Mark is in my chair, asking author’s all about how to be a successful writer – but this week I’ve literally turned the table on him. Mark’s latest novel – Babes in the Wood – is the second in his Witches of Woodville series. It continues the small village exploits of Faye, magical ingenue, budding witch, and all-round take-no-nonsense-from-nobody heroine. As the second world war rages over the sea, the tiny village of Woodville comes under attack once more from dark, sorcerous forces (this time it’s NAZIS!!)Told you it sounded cosy!No worries though. Aside from the inherent darkness beneath Mark’s whimsy, we also pack in enough nightmare fuel with a lengthy discussion of the most horrifying 80s kids’ TV characters, the all-too-real horrors of nostalgic nationalism, and I ask Mark for some gossip about the author’s he’s spoken to.There’s a lot to enjoy here. Get the kettle on!Babes in the Wood  was published on October 28th by Simon & Schuster Other books mentioned in this episode include: Jack’s Game (2021), by Andrew Chapman Nella Last’s War: The Second World War Diaries of ‘Housewife 49’ (2006), by Nella Last, edited by Richard Broad and Suzi Fleming Trailer for Mark’s new horror-movie UnwelcomeSupport the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com.Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textHalloween is over for another year but there are still plenty of monsters to go around.Our guest this week is Kim Newman, the writer, critic and encyclopaedic authority on horror, pulp and the dark recesses of cinematic history. You may know him as the author of the Anno Dracula series, but that’s only the tip of his imaginative iceberg.Kim’s new novel, Something More than Night, takes all of that arcane knowledge and puts it to use – transporting us back to the Hollywood of the 1930s when fascism is on the rise and it’s hard to tell the movie monsters from the real madmen. Cue the pairing of horror-icon Boris Karloff and gumshoe writer Raymond Chandler, who unite to confront some very strange goings on behind the scenes.In between educating me on the finer points of Hollywood history, Kim talks about the enduring legacy of Frankenstein, imitating Chandler’s unique style, writing novels in a connected universe  - and we realise just how similar he is to Quention Tarantino. This one is an absolute blast.Enjoy! Something More than Night was published on November 2nd by Titan Books.Other books mentioned in this episode include: Anno Dracula (1992), by Kim Newman Anno Dracula 1999: Daikaiju (1999), by Kim Newman Nightmare Movies: Horror on Screen Since the 1960s (1988) by Kim Newman. (latest expanded edition, 2011) The Dark Country (1982), by Dennis Etchison Hollywood the Haunted House (1967), by Paul Mayersberg An Illustrated History of the Horror Film (1967), by Carlos Clarens Support the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com.Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textNormally we talk books - but horror movies are a Hallowe’en staple. Turn the lights down, wrap yourself in a blanket, choose your snack of choice and then torment yourself terribly. It’s what we do.Now, Mark Kermode knows a thing or two about scary movies. The UK’s most prominent film critic has a special fondness for horror movies, as well as a grounding in the books that inspired many of the best. I asked him on the show for this Hallowe’en special episode, to talk about his favourite book-to-movie horror adaptations.No one who has ever heard Mark speak for more than ten minutes will have any doubt what his number one is – but the others may surprise you. At the very least, you’ll came away with suggestions for books to read and movies to watch over this most frightful of weekends.Oh, and if you like Mickey Rourke, then just hold out for the last five minutes…Enjoy! Books mentioned in this episode include:  The Exorcist (1971), by William Peter Blatty Falling Angel (1978), by William Hjortsberg The Midwich Cuckoos (1957), by John Wyndham The Haunting of Hill House (1959), by Shirley Jackson “Don’t Look Now”, in Not After Midnight, and Other Stories (1971), by Daphne Du Maurier The Exorcist: BFI Modern Classics (1997), by Mark Kermode Ghost Story (1979), by Peter Straub Link to the Guardian Article on the state of the horror novel – https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/oct/29/chapter-and-curse-is-the-horror-novel-entering-a-golden-ageSupport the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com.Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textPerfect places breed hideous crimes – that’s my understanding at least. If you like The Twilight Zone, Black Mirror, or Twin Peaks (or anything by David Lynch) then you’ll get a kick out of Catherynne M. Valente’s Comfort Me with Apples.Despite being a novella of less than 130 pages, it crams in everything from the whole rotten tradition of awful things – from the book of Genesis, via fairytales and the Gothic, all the way up to the most cutting-edge dystopian sci-fi. This tiny tale of a perfect small town and a perfect marriage, all undercut with the sour tang of wrongness. Catherynne talks in detail about the various strands that she has knotted together into this story. We cover religion and the potential for evil within, Disney towns and cartoon police, and we discuss why Bluebeard and his locked cellar door is such a key and recurrent trope in domestic horror. And, as ever, I take the chance to go off on a frothing political rant.Enjoy! Comfort Me with Apples is published by Tor on November 9th Check out Mark Kermode’s rant about the movie Entourage – to prepare for the Hallowe’en special.Support the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com. Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textI’m on holiday but I still give you goodies. ‘Cos that’s the kind of all-round good guy that I am.And what a dark treat of a trick we have this week. The guest is Cassandra Khaw and their novella Nothing But Blackened Teeth will use it’s liquorice-stained smile to chew you up.The book transports us to a crumbling mansion in Japan, where a hideous spectre haunts a group of utterly loathsome tourists. Honestly, you’ll want them dead for their taste in music alone!Despite the slimness of the volume, Cass packs a lot into this book, just as we pack a lot into this conversation. As well as discussing the novella specifically, we also talk our fear and fondness for Ellen Datlow, the rich heritage of South East Asian ghost stories and the haunting house as colonised space. She also gives perhaps the best ever answer to the question “what really scares you?” It is a life lesson. Excuse my whining about my dog. Enjoy Nothing But Blackened Teeth was published on Tor Nightfire on 20th OctoberBooks discussed on this episode include:  Queen of the Cicadas (2021), by V. Castro When the Reckoning Comes (2021), by LaTanya McQueen The Only Good Indians (2020), by Stephen Graham Jones Sandman Slim (2009), by Richard Kadrey What Moves the Dead (coming 2022), by T. Kingfisher Support the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com.Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Send us a textHello kids. Wanna see a magic trick? Rather than pulling a rabbit from a hat, I offer you Caitlin Starling, author of The Luminous Dead and her new Gothic chiller, The Death of Jane Lawrence. Caitlin’s novel takes a familiar Gothic set-up and kicks it around until it is only recognisable from the colour of its blood. Dilapidated house – check. Deceitful husband – check. Magical rites, mysterious walls and ghosts that feed on shame – yeah that’s new!We talk all about magical rites and occult practices, but before things get too esoteric and in-the-weeds, we also discuss Hannibal the TV show, whether there is life after death, and how best to incorporate neurodivergence into a dark gothic fantasy. You’ll come out of this one, entertained, entranced AND with a whole new reading and viewing list.EnjoyThe Death of Jane Lawrence was published on October 5th by St Martin’s Press.Unexplained podcast episode featuring Aleister Crowley:http://www.unexplainedpodcast.com/episodes/2016/6/18/episode-10-the-spaces-that-linger Books discussed on this episode include: Jane Eyre (1847), by Charlotte Brontë Wuthering Heights (1847), by Emily Brontë Under the Pendulum Sun (2017), by Jeanette Ng Vita Nostra (2007), by Marina and Sergey Dyachenko Support the show on Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/TalkingScaredPodCome talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com.Download Novellic on Google Play or Apple Store.Support the show Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices