Headlights

Thank you NetGalley and Tor Publishing/Tor Nightfire for the advance copy of Headlights by CJ Leede.

I knew it was going to be good, but I didn't know it was going to be this good. Is it weird to say CJ Leede has written my favorite Stephen King novel? I know, every horror writer and their cat gets compared to Stephen King in one way or another, but here's why I say it: besides the obvious reasons SK would come to mind within the first pages, the best thing about King and the thing that Leede took and infused with her particular flavor of WTF-ery, is the everyday, run of the mill, regular person suddenly dealing with very irregular, extraordinary circumstances, both within and without themselves.

I finished reading this about 24 hours ago, and my stomach is still in knots thinking of the mix of fear, grief, and whirling memories that are the throughline for main character Daniel (and at points for almost every other character).

Daniel is probably the last person on earth who needs to be in the FBI right now - he can’t even look in a mirror, he’s suffering from post-traumatic stress (for basically his whole life), and reality is as much a mix of memories and hallucinations as it is what’s in front of him, but he gets pulled back home to Denver four years after leaving because a string of strange serial murders that ended right before he left have started up again, and his old team needs him to help figure out what’s going on.

As the investigation deepens and questions are not only not answered but just keep multiplying, Headlights gets further from detective thriller and closer to cosmic horror until Leede expertly weaves in all the strands to the perfect finish.

Randomlings:

That cover art by Carly Janine Mazur. That’s exactly what reading the book feels like.

That sex scene. You know the one. I mean. Not for me but also kinda hot, right? 

Pub. Date: June 9, 2026