Turn The Page – Episode 406E – C.J. Leede

C.J. Leede’s novel *Headlights* isn’t just a thriller—it’s a visceral exploration of grief, mortality, and the haunting weight of memory, wrapped in a surreal mystery where people wake up naked on highways wearing the skin of strangers. The guest reveals that the book emerged from a personal crisis, born during daily walks while processing loss, transforming trauma into a narrative that interrogates what it means to survive death—both others’ and our own. Leede draws from deep wells of personal history: his medieval studies, his love of Star Trek, and his upbringing in music-filled Texas homes, all of which inform the novel’s layered themes of legacy, identity, and the invisible forces that shape us. The Colorado setting becomes a character itself—beautiful yet terrifying, mirroring the psychological terrain of the protagonist, Special Agent Daniel Stansfield, a man haunted by PTSD and haunted by the past. What makes *Headlights* truly daring is its unflinching integration of sex and horror, not as spectacle, but as intimate, human experiences that reveal character and deepen emotional stakes. Leede defends the 20-page erotic scene not as indulgence, but as essential storytelling—vulnerable, raw, and necessary. He’s already deep into his fourth book, a New York-set novel weaving in his academic love of Joan of Arc, proving that his literary journey is as much about excavation as it is about invention.