207 – Lena Valencia & What Can Lurk Where There Are No Shadows?

Literary or genre fiction? Dumb question.

This week’s guest showcases just how dumb! With her debut collection of stories, Mystery Lights showing that horror is literary and literary is horror. These tales of the American desert are full of hauntings, monsters, killers, and other oddities, yet they take a non-typical approach to the strangeness. They care more about the human in the mix than the weird thing in the corner.

I loved them – and they proved that every time I think I know my own reading tastes, I find an exception to the rule.

Lena and I talk about her literary allegiance to the desert, about the literary establishment’s appetite for strange things, about women treating women poorly, and about how she writes stories that don’t need to “click.”

Enjoy.

• The Shining (1977), by Stephen King
• “Lamb to the Slaughter,” (1953), by Roald Dahl
• The Garden (2024), by Claire Beams

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