About Us
![](https://talkingscaredpod.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Neil-McRobert-profile.jpeg)
Neil McRobert
Your Podcast host
Neil is a writer, podcaster and recovering academic. After completing a PhD in Contemporary Gothic Fiction (useful!) He fled the ivory halls to live a quiet life amidst the moors and dark satanic mills of northern England. Here he dwells, writing words, talking to famous writers and doting upon his dog. And yes, that is Stephen King’s front gate in the photo.
Want me to write for you? Get in touch.
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Ted
Your Podcast mascot
The reason i’m a freelance podcaster (who could leave that face at home?). My own personal Cujo. He gets more likes than me on Instagram.
THINGS I HAVE WRITTEN
Look upon my works and despair…
- The Best Horror Books of 2024 – Esquire (ongoing)
- Why Carrie is Still Scary as Shit! – Esquire (April 2024)
- 11 Books That Scratch the 3-Body Itch – Vulture (March 2024)
- 12 Books to Read if You Can’t Move on From Night Country – Vulture (February 2024)
- The Best Horror Books of 2023 – Esquire (December 2023)
- My Macabre Weekend at StokerCon – Esquire (October 2023)
- The Scariest Sci-Fi Horror Movies for Halloween – New Scientist (Oct 2023)
- Shock of the New: Jordan Peele, Mariana Enriquez and More on the Horror Fiction Renaissance – Guardian (October 2023)
- The Long Tale (Tail?) of Dogs in Fiction – Esquire (August 2023)
- Whalefall Review – New Scientist (August 2023)
- Interview with Lauren Beukes – Elle (August 2023)
- Generation H: Meet the Writer’s Shaping Horror’s Next Golden Age – Esquire (July 2023)
Black Mirror Season 6: The Good, The Bad and The Existentially Harrowing – Elle (June 2023)
- The Deluge, review – Guardian (March 2023)
- How Black Filmmakers Reinvented the Horror Genre – Esquire (Feb 2023)
- The 22 Best Horror Books of 2022 – Esquire (Nov 2022)
- What to Read this Halloween and Beyond – Guardian (Oct 2022)
- Where to Start with Stephen King – Guardian (Aug 2022)
- The Fifty Best Horror Books of All Time Will Scare You Sh*tless – Esquire (May 2022)
- All 75 Stephen King Books, Ranked – Esquire (Sept 2022)
- The Final Girl Breaks Out –Slate (Sept 2021)
- Billy Summers, review – Guardian (August 2021)
- Project Fear: What Will Brexit Gothic Look Like? – Guardian (Feb 2019)
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167 – Nat Cassidy & A New York State of Death
Nat Cassidy returns to guide us through the haunted hallways and avenues of his New York, vamp-adjacent novel, Nestlings.
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166 – Sam Rebelein & You Had Me At Tongue-Monster!
Sam Rebelein’s Edenville is a LOT of story. Scary academia, a cosmic framework, and enough monsters to fill Guillermo del Toro’s minibus.
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165 – Josh Malerman, Ronald Malfi & The Rock ‘n’ Roll Rhythm of the Novella
I’m joined by Josh Malerman and Ronald Malfi for a freewheeling masterclass in writing an effective novella.
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164 – Out There Screaming Roundtable, with Nnedi Okorafor, Lesley Nneka Arimah & Maurice Broaddus
This week is a special roundtable episode. An exciting, challenging and very thought-provoking tour of contemporary Black horror.
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163 – Liz Hand & Visiting the Thing That Walks Alone
We’re heading back to the most haunted house of all. Shirley Jackson’s Hill House. For a sequel!
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162 – Chuck Wendig & American as Evil Apple Pie
Chuck’s new novel, Black River Orchard is all about apples. Tasty, evil, corruptive. And great fun!
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161 – Clay McLeod Chapman & The Chesapeake Softshell Shuffle
Clay McLeod Chapman returns to answer questions, about What Kind of Mother, the first being what the f**k Clay?!
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160 – Isabel Cañas & Many Types of Bloodsucker
Isabel Cañas returns to the show to talk about her second novel, Vampires of El Norte – a sweeping historical love-story… with bloodsuckers.
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159 – Alexander James & An Encounter in the Woods
Alexander James loves the woods. Who knows why? Nothing good ever happens there, as his debut, The Woodkin, makes clear.
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158 – Catriona Ward & Rewriting American Gothic (Like, Literally)
If you thought The Last House on Needless Street was tricksy, just wait until you hear about Looking Glass Sound. It’s a destined Gothic classic
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157 – Josh Winning & The World Through Blood-Tinted Glasses
Josh Winning has parlayed years of writing about film sets into a horror novel full of 90s retro slasher love.
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156 – Sadie Hartmann & The Books of Our Horrid Hearts
Sadie Hartmann, AKA Mother Horror to the likes of us. She knows a thing or two about this haunted library we love to browse.
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149 – Clowns at Midnight – The Big IT Deep-Dive (Part Two), with Ally Malinenko & Nat Cassidy
In this second part of the dive into Stephen King’s IT, things are getting weird. We’re delving into Pennywise.
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148 – Feral Childhoods – The Big IT Deep-Dive (Part One), with Ally Malinenko & Nat Cassidy
Yes, finally we’re off to Derry, to do battle with that goddamn clown. In this first part we talk Losers and why we love them
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147 – Mike Flanagan & Lighting Up the Darkness
We’re joined this week by Mike Flanagan, our most literary horror director, to talk haunted houses and Dark Towers.
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146 – Paula. D. Ashe & A Bizarre & Bitter Reprieve
The Empress of Excess is here to talk about extreme horror, horrendous crimes and the thorny problem of readers’ feelings.
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145 – Sarah Gailey & The Scariest Place in the House
What if the house that shaped you was a broken, haunted place? Sarah Gailey’s Just Like Home asks this very question.
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144 – Nicholas Binge & the Spookiest of Entanglements
Nicholas Binge is the author the horror-sci-fi, Ascension. It’s about a very weird mountain that lures the unwary. Nothing good occurs, of course.
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143 – Alice Slater & Bookish Murder Vibes
Alice Slater’s Death of a Bookseller pull back the veil on this industry we love… and finds monsters.
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142 – Katrina Monroe & Birthing the Ultimate Body Horror
Parenting horror has seen a lot of great titles in recent years, but Katrina’s novel may be my favourite. Ghosts and chafing!
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141 – Justin Cronin & Telling the Goat Joke
You know Justin Cronin for the landmark The Passage. Now he’s swapping vampire plagues for something subtler … but no less terrifying.
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140 – Andrew F. Sullivan & The Cutest Mould in Fungus City
What if the world ended, not with a bang, but a slow squelch? That’s the premise of The Marigold, the brand-new dystopia from Andrew F.
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139 – Ai Jiang & Home is Where the Haunt Is
This week we’re dissecting spectres and excavating the haunted house in Ai Jiang’s word-of-mouth smash, Linghun.
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138 – Rachel Eve Moulton & The Bellybutton of the Beast
The Insatiable Volt Sisters is the weirdest island story since Lost, or Brexit. Curses, killer quarries and the wearing of other people’s skin.
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137 – Kelly Link & Once Upon a Time in a Ghost Story
Kelly Link knows a thing or two about the darkness inside fairy tales. White Cat, Black Dog twists them into new shapes.
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136 – Max Booth III & Stories With Teeth
Terrible times and awful words await us this week.Max Booth III is here to talk about his new collection of uber-dark stories, Abnormal Statistics.
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135 – Victor LaValle & The Weird, Weird West
Wagons West with Victor Lavalle. We talk about his weird western: Lone Women. Homesteading, monsters, tears and fear.
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134 – Margaret Atwood & Hope in the Dystopia
Breathe! Our guest is Margaret Atwood. We talk dystopias, the Canadian wilderness, men who turn into bears, horror and slapstick, and her own haunted house.
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133 – Jacqueline Holland & At Last! Vampires!
Jacqueline and I talk about horror imposter-syndrome, New England vampire lore, the terror of living forever, and the joy of being a ‘dark weirdo.’
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132 – Matt Ruff & A Hostile Universe Here on Earth
I take a road trip with Matt Ruff, through Lovecraft Country, talking racism, cosmic horror and writing Black stories from a white perspective.
A Special Thanks to my Patrons
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