Ten stories, most of them set in the desert Southwest, most of them about women in situations that tilt just past ordinary. A wellness retreat that goes wrong. Influencers in a canyon. A boarding school. A woman on the road near Marfa. Valencia keeps the horror mostly offstage and the tone dry, so the unease comes from the social dynamics — hierarchy, ambition, a group deciding somebody doesn’t count — with the landscape doing the rest. Debut collection, and she’s very good on the specific menace of an empty road at night.
Mystery Lights