No one let the Pope listen to this week’s episode.
Our guest is Natasha Pulley, genre-defying author of The Watchmaker of Filigree Street, The Bedlam Stacks, The Kingdoms, and now, in the The Salt King she pits the Vatican and Catholic Doctrine against something much, much older, lurking in the salt mines of the world.
It leads us to a conversation about faith of many kinds, about reality-adjacent fiction, the horrid truth of Sodom and Gomorrah, dark representations of the Catholic Church, and the challenge of fusing folk horror and global apocalypse.
There are also some holy dick pics.
Enjoy!
Other books mentioned:
Gentle Things (2026), by Danielle Giles
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (2024), by Susanna Clarke
The Hill in the Dark Grove (2026), by Liam Higginson
The Name of the Rose (1980), by Umberto Eco
Foundation (1951), by Isaac Asimov
A Canticle for Liebowitz (1959), by Walter M. Miller Jr
Father Alberto and the Flying Girl (2026), by Timothy X Atack
Support Talking Scared on Patreon
Check out the Talking Scared Merch line – at VoidMerch
Come talk books on Threads, Bluesky, and Instagram, or email direct to talkingscaredpod@gmail.com
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
