Episode · The Book Review · 2025-10-24
Books mentioned on Joe Hill's Scary Book Recs and Victor LaValle on "The Haunting of Hill House" (Rerun)
Books mentioned, in the order they came up
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20th Century Ghosts
20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill is a chilling and acclaimed short story collection that showcases the author's versatility and mastery of supernatural fiction, featuring inventive tales that explore grief, nostalgia, and terror.
Discussed“I think I did a short story called The Black Phone that was in 20th Century Ghost and at the time I wrote it, it was the furthest thing from my mind, but when I look at it now, I see the influence of that book all over that story.”
Where to get it
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Lost Man's Lane
Lost Man's Lane by Scott Carson is a mystery suspense novel blending atmospheric dread and supernatural elements.
Recommended“The first one is Lost Man's Lane by Scott Carson. Who is Scott Carson? Not who he appears to be.”
Where to get it
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Those Who Wish Me Dead
Discussed“Scott Carson is a pen name for the thriller writer Michael Karita. Michael's probably best known for a novel under his own name called Those Who Wish Me Dead, which was made into an intense backwoods thriller starring Angelina Jolie”
Where to get it
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Fever House
Fever House by Keith Rosson is an energetic, fast-paced horror novel driven by a classic and macabre premise involving an evil severed head that wreaks supernatural havoc in an otherwise recognizable world.
Discussed“I will say the devil by name. The followup presents us with a world that has been profoundly changed. Fever house is set in our world as we understand it with the supernatural intruding on life as we know it. And the devil by name is something of the reverse where the real world is now intruding on a world”
Where to get it
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The Reformatory
The Reformatory by Tananarive Due is a gripping historical horror novel set in Jim Crow-era Florida, following a young boy sent to a terrifying reform school where he can see and communicate with ghosts.
Recommended“This is a book called The Reformatory. Yeah, The Reformatory by Tanana Reef Du is just out in paperback. It also just won the World Fantasy Award for best novel.”
Where to get it
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The House with a Clock in Its Walls
The House with a Clock in Its Walls by John Bellairs is a classic dark fantasy novel about an orphan boy who discovers witchcraft and magic after moving into his uncle's mysterious house.
Discussed“And in the course of trying to impress another boy, Lewis accidentally cast some gets involved with necromancy and raises the spirit of evil, terrible person. And I've read that book. I've probably read House with Clock and it walls a dozen times over the course of my life.”
Where to get it
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The Haunting of Hill House
The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson is a celebrated classic horror novel about a haunted mansion and psychological isolation.
Discussed“And as a kid who was in love with Stephen King at the time, but who was not supremely well read, I treated that book like, as many people did, I'm sure, like a just a list, a bibliography. Here's everything you got to read. And for better or worse, Shirley Jackson's Haunting of Hill House was one of the”
Where to get it
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Danse Macabre
Danse Macabre is a non-fiction critical overview of the horror genre by Stephen King that surveys horror across literature, film, and television from the mid-twentieth century through the 1970s.
Discussed“It actually begins before Shirley Jackson. It begins with Stephen King and his book Dance Macabra, which was his 80s summary of the horror field in general.”
Where to get it
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The Shining
The Shining by Stephen King is a classic horror novel about a struggling writer and recovering alcoholic who takes a winter caretaker job at an isolated, haunted mountain hotel with his family.
Discussed“And then the other thing that she does that to me is even more rarified within the haunted house field, although certainly anyone who's read The Shining will understand it is that a lot of haunted house stories turn out to be that there's an entity there that is the cause.”
Where to get it
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House of Leaves
House of Leaves is a complex postmodern novel by Mark Z.
Discussed“If you think about books that came decades later, like House of Leaves, which is about a house that keeps mutating, growing bigger on the inside.”
Where to get it
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Lone Women
Lone Women is a historical horror novel by Victor LaValle that follows a woman escaping her past with a heavy trunk in early twentieth-century Montana.
Discussed“Have you ever borrowed anything from this book for your work? A character name, a beat, a motivation, a tone. What have you pulled out of it? Well, actually, I mean, rereading it again just over the weekend, the opening bits, I realized the beginning of Lone Women is Eleanor's escape”
Where to get it
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We Have Always Lived in the Castle
We Have Always Lived in the Castle is a chilling psychological thriller novel by Shirley Jackson, published in 1962, that follows the isolated and eccentric Blackwood family following a tragic arsenic poisoning.
Recommended“How about because the other the nice thing is then I might recommend the we have always lived in the castle because that one begins with a much clearer in theory introduction to the main character Maryat. And she's super weird, but it's more concrete.”
Where to get it
Other mentions in this episode (13) — ad reads, self-promotion and passing references, never counted
“First from 2024, Joe Hill, who has just released his first novel in almost a decade, King Sorrow, came on the Pod.”
“And then after the break, Victor Laval, author of 2023's Lone Women, talks about the book he's read the most in his life, a book I have read many times, The Great Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House.”
“And then after the break, Victor Laval, author of 2023's Lone Women, talks about the book he's read the most in his life, a book I have read many times, The Great Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House.”
“The first time I read you before interviewing you, I feel like years ago for Time magazine for Horns, this was a very long time ago, was 20th Century Ghost, which is a short story collection.”
“I remember that we spoke in a restaurant in Boston around 2010 for horns and shortly afterwards I had a nervous breakdown and a divorce.”
“I've got a new one that'll be out next year called King Sorrow where I was trying to write it.”
“That was my conversation from last October with Joe Hill, who has just released his first novel in almost a decade, King Sorrow.”
“I'm Gilbert Cruz, editor of the New York Times Book Review, and I am presenting you now with a conversation that I had with a great writer from two years ago, Victor Laval, who wrote a piece of historical horror fiction called Lone Women. He is talking about Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House.”
“I'm Gilbert Cruz, editor of the New York Times Book Review, and I am presenting you now with a conversation that I had with a great writer from two years ago, Victor Laval, who wrote a piece of historical horror fiction called Lone Women. He is talking about Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House.”
“Alongside Henry James' The Turn of the Screw and Stephen King's The Shining, The Haunting of Hill House, published in 1959, is one of the seminal haunted house stories of the 20th century.”
“Alongside Henry James' The Turn of the Screw and Stephen King's The Shining, The Haunting of Hill House, published in 1959, is one of the seminal haunted house stories of the 20th century.”
“I've been speaking with Victor Laval about Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House and about his new novel, Lone Women.”
“I've been speaking with Victor Laval about Shirley Jackson's The Haunting of Hill House and about his new novel, Lone Women.”