Talking Scared

Latest Episodes:

230 – Alex Grecian & Weirdos in the West Mar 11, 2025

Show notes

Saddle up for a weird west week on Talking Scared. The start of a loose trilogy of sorts.

This first instalment features Alex Grecian, talking about his fantastical vision of the Old West (and East) in 2023’s Red Rabbit and the brand-new follow-up, Rose of Jericho.

We cover western inspirations, the melancholia of ghosts, Kansas legends and surprising witches. There’s also a nerdy little cryptid section thrown in there too cos you know I can’t resist.

It’s a charmer this week. With a glint in its eye.

Enjoy!

Other books mentioned:

The Yard (2012), by Alex Grecian
Lonesome Dove (1985), by Larry McMurtry
The Staircase in the Woods (forthcoming 2025), by Chuck Wendig
The Summer People (2015), by Kelly Link
“Skinders Veil,” in White Cat, Black Dog (2023), by Kelly Link
Knock Knock, Open Wide (2023), by Neil Sharpson
Pet Semetary (1983), by Stephen King

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229 – Agustina Bazterrica & The Wicked Nuns of Oz Mar 05, 2025

Show notes

No one is doing dystopia right now like Agustina Bazterrica.

After Tender is the Flesh made us all consider vegetarianism, now she’s back for a long hard look at patriarchy, religion and populism in The Unworthy.

It’s a quiet end of the world, set almost entirely in the confines of a strange convent, and the cult who will do anything to maintain their power.

We talk about how Agustina finds the necessary voice of her characters, why love is just another form of madness, how science-fiction just can’t look away from misogyny, and how she once read five books to find a new word for penis.

Enjoy!

Other books mentioned:

Tender is the Flesh (2017), by Agustina Bazterrica
The Handmaid’s Tale (1985), by Margaret Atwood
Caliban and the Witch (2004), by Silvia Federici
Dune (1965), by Frank Herbert
A Canticle For Liebowitz (1959), by Walter M. Miller Jr.
Silent Spring (1962), by Rachel Carson
Fever Dream (2014), by Samanta Schweblin
Los Demenios En El Convento (1985), by Fernando Benitez
Brat (2024), by Gabriel Smith
The Perfect Nanny (2016), by Leila Slimani

Support Talking Scared on Patreon

Check out the Talking Scared Merch line – at VoidMerch

Come talk books on Bluesky @talkscaredpod.bsky.social on Instagram/Threads, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com

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Off Book #7 – Scott Derrickson Feb 28, 2025

Show notes

The latest Off Book episode has me facing my demons.

My guest is Scott Derrickson, one of the best horror movie makers to ever do it. He scared us with Sinister, moved us with The Black Phone, marvelled us with Doctor Strange, and ruined my life with The Exorcism of Emily Rose.

He’s back with The Gorge, a mad genre mashup, starring Anya-Taylor Joy and Miles Teller, currently streaming on Apple+.

Scott joins me for a leisurely conversation about making that artistically-inclined ‘drive-in’ movie, as well as a tour through the highs (and lows) of his filmography.

We get into the beauty and terror of super 8 film, his relationship with Joe Hill, and the challenge of the substantial, character led horror film. All complemented with blasts of lilting birdsong from Scott’s LA garden.

Plus, a little hint of what to expect from The Black Phone 2!

Enjoy!

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228 – Sophie White & An Island of Formless Dread Feb 25, 2025

Show notes

Ready to hear a conversation about some devastatingly dark things?

Sophie White and I have got you covered!

In this expansive chat, we talk about her calculatingly distressing novel, Where I End – in which an isolated island community plays host to the worst, cruellest kind of loneliness. And that books is a springboard for others things, psychosis, weaponised empathy, real-life atrocity and the way that all that darkness can seep into a place forever.

But then we also have a good old chat about books we love, and we swear a lot… so there’s a bright side.

This is a key conversation for me. A pivotal episode.

Enjoy!

Other books mentioned:

Recipes For a Nervous Breakdown (2016), by Sophie White
Corpsing: My Body and Other Horror Shows (2020), by Sophie White
Apt Pupil (1982), by Stephen King
The Yellow Wallpaper (1892), by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
The Girl Next Door (1989), by Jack Ketchum
Sharkheart: A Love Story (2023), by Emily Habeck
The Lamb (2025), by Lucy Rose
Tender is the Flesh (2017), by Augustina Bazterrica
Lunar Park (2005), by Bret Easton Ellis
Our Wives Under the Seas (2022), by Julia Armfield
Follow Me To Ground (2018), by Sue Rainsford

Support Talking Scared on Patreon

Check out the Talking Scared Merch line – at VoidMerch

Come talk books on Bluesky @talkscaredpod.bsky.social on Instagram/Threads, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com

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227 – Kirsty Logan & Queer as in F**K You Feb 18, 2025

Show notes

The title speaks volumes this week. It’s a mission statement.

Kirsty Logan is the master of certain kind of edgy, on-the-margins fiction, Queer in every meaning of the word. She can be witchy and folkloric, or contemporary and cutting edge – and all of that range is showcased in her new collection, No & Other Love Stories.

We talk about female desire and monstrous fantasy, formal experimentation and the personal logic of stories…and some reassuringly unsettling focus on the erotics of human flesh and menstruation.

Don’t say we shy away here at Talking Scared.

Enjoy!

Other books mentioned:

Things We Say in the Dark (2019), by Kirsty Logan
The Unfamiliar: A Queer Motherhood Memoir (2023), by Kirsty Logan
“Skeleton,” by Ray Bradbury (1945), by Ray Bradbury
Carrion Crow (2025), by Heather Parry
“Tiptoe,” in Not a Speck of Light (2024), by Laird Barron

Support Talking Scared on Patreon

Check out the Talking Scared Merch line – at VoidMerch

Come talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com

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226 – Virginia Feito & A Good Old-Fashioned Bad Girl Feb 11, 2025

Show notes

Time to misbehave.

Virginia Feito’s new novel, Victorian Psycho, is all about good behaviour, positive standards and polite conduct…and what happens when you flout all that, by – I dunno – slaughtering a houseload of people.

It’s a much buzzed about book that takes the psychopathy of American Psycho back to the straightlaced, be-corseted world of the 19th Century, then let’s rip. We talk about glorious violence, the humour of extremity, Charles Dickens and Bret Easton Ellis…and have a deeply amusing conversation about infanticide.

Queen Victorian would be appalled.

Enjoy!

Other books mentioned:

Mrs March (2021), by Virginia Feito
American Psycho (1991), by Bret Easton Ellis
A Christmas Carol (1843), by Charles Dickens
Nightmare Abbey (1818), by Thomas Peacock
The Secret Garden (1911), by Frances Hodgson Burnett
The Lamb (2025), by Lucy Rose
Come Closer (2003), by Sara Gran
The Fate of Mary Rose (1981), by Caroline Blackwood
David Copperfield (1850), by Charles Dickens

Support Talking Scared on Patreon

Check out the Talking Scared Merch line – at VoidMerch

Come talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com

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225 – Lucy Rose & The Cumbrian Chainsaw Massacre Feb 04, 2025

Show notes

Are you hungry?

Depending on your…erm… tastes, the next hour of conversation will do strange things to your appetite. Our guest is Lucy Rose, whose debut novel, The Lamb renders muscle and fat and sorrow down into a rich stew of cannibalism and rural Gothic.

We talk about how rooted this book is in the landscape, history and folklore of Northern England – and we also talk a lot about eating people. How to make it sound gross… how to make it sound weirdly poetic.

This is a book that’s gonna get people talking.

Enjoy!

Other books mentioned:

Tender is the Flesh (2017), by Augustina Bazterrica
No & Other Love Stories (2025), by Kirsty Logan
The Tryst (2017), by Monique Rossey

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Come talk books on Twitter @talkscaredpod, on Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com

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Let Us Palaver #1 – The Gunslinger Debrief Feb 03, 2025

Show notes

Here is the first Let Us Palaver minisode – in which Nat Cassidy and I kick Chris off the call, and get to grips with the inner workings of The Dark Tower, without spoiling anything for him, or any of you on your first trip through these books.

If you still listen after this spoiler warning and the two I give in the first few minutes of the episode… well, you only have yourself to blame.

But for seasoned ‘slingers. I hope this is fun.

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The Dark Tower Deep Dive #1 – The Gunslinger Jan 28, 2025

Show notes

“The man in black fled across the desert, and the podcaster followed…”

Welcome to the start of what is sure to be an epic journey. Step by step, over more than a dozen episodes, Talking Scared will be following the beam all the way to the Dark Tower – that mad edifice at the heart of Stephen King’s opus. Maybe it’s the heart of every story ever told… time will tell.

Unlike Roland Deschain, I don’t go alone. I’m joined by author and fellow King-nut, Nat Cassidy (Mary, Nestlings, When the Wolf Comes Home) and absolute newbie, Chris Panatier (The Phlebotomist, The Redemption of Morgan Bright) and in this first ever episode we tussle with the tricky, dusty, thorny opening that is Book One: The Gunslinger.

What follows dives deep into the book, but is 100% spoiler free about anything beyond it. So if you’ve only read The Gunslinger, you’re good to go.

I hope you enjoy our wanderings. I hope you tinct. I hope you darkle.

Other books mentioned:

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft (2000), by Stephen King
It (1986), by Stephen King
The Jerusalem Man (1988), by David Gemmell
The Book of the New Sun (series, 1980-1987), by Gene Wolfe

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Off Book #6 – Dutch Marich & Horror in the High Desert Jan 24, 2025

Show notes

The latest Off Book episode takes you out to the American desert and leaves you there, cold, alone and confused.

We’re speaking with Dutch Marich, the surprisingly lovely mind behind the most terrifying found footage I’ve seen in years – The Horror in the High Desert series.

These films are full of a particular kind of fear. Never obscure, but always hidden – leaving you as fascinated as you are scared. It’s the kind of weird, collective storytelling that used to set internet forums alight!

In this 100% spoiler-free conversation, Dutch and I talk about withholding answers, we discuss the scary side of Nevada and his fascination with unexplained disappearances. And he even tell us the tenuous connection between his movies and Stephen King’s Desperation.

Plus, if you’re a fan of these movies, you’ll find out a little info on what’s coming in the next instalment.

Enjoy!

Sign Dutch's petition

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