Gus Moreno Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Gus Moreno
Author Gus Moreno was born in Chicago. His stories have appeared in places like LitroNY, Pseudopod, the Burnt Tongues anthology, Bluestem Magazine, and Aurealis, as well as a bunch of other places that are definitely not defunct.

He likes professional wrestling, anything by The xx, denim jackets, and neighborhood pizza.

Some of his favorite books are Battle Royale, American Psycho, and Under the Skin. And a few of his favorite authors include Joan Didion, Amy Hempel, Margaret Atwood, and Lucia Berlin.

Gus may live in the suburbs with his wife and their dogs, just never think that for one single second that he is not from Chicago.

His sister-in-law Carol died in the year 2017, who was somebody that he had known since he was ten years old. When it happened, his creative well had run dry. Writing about fictional people felt frivolous in the face of such a great loss. He didn’t care about writing any longer, but he did want to stop crying so much. Since writing has always been the way that Gus has let out what was bottled up inside of him.

Since this internal valve was broken, he had to seek his comfort in other places. Only way to relieve the pressure building inside of him was in the works of others. He read books about grief, and consumed content about how to deal with the loss of others, looking for meaning in her death.

It was only when Gus put down the grief books and picked up horror stories that he found what he was actually searching for. Not to escape from his grief but a way to actually dive deeper into it. You do not have to look that hard to find horror books and movies which deal with loss in some way.

It’s the only genre that was not out to polish his grief into a stepping stone to get him back to normalcy. It validated everything that he was feeling, and wove all of it into a larger tapestry of the supernatural and uncanny, things which cannot be explained away, or shouldn’t exist in our world but do.

These stories, with their lessons on storytelling and loss, each provided a space where he could experience characters navigating the exact same feelings he was immersed in. they helped him find a way to balance each of these emotions through his artistic expression yet again, eventually providing footholds in his own writing process, and helped him shape “This Thing Between Us”.

Gus’ debut novel, called “This Thing Between Us”, was released in the year 2021, having been published by MCD Books. It is from the horror genre.

“This Thing Between Us” is the first stand alone novel and was released in the year 2021. It was Vera’s idea to buy the Itza. Thiago was not interested in the “world’s most advanced smart speaker!” one bit, however Vera believed that it’d be a bit of fun for them both amid all of the odd occurrences that happen in the condo.

It just made things that much worse. The scratching in the walls and cold spots were strange enough, but these peculiar packages began showing up at the house. All of it is stuff that they didn’t even order. Who would order industrial lye, anyway? Then there was the spooky music at strange hours, Thiago waking up to Itza projecting these light shows in some empty room.

It was all odd and funny right up until Vera gets murdered, and Thiago’s world soon gets to be unbearable. Politicians and pundits all look to turn his wife’s death into a symbol for their own personal agendas. A barrage of text messages from her well meaning buddies about moving on and letting go. Waking up to the sound of Itza talking so softly to somebody in the living room.

All there was left to do was just get far away from Chicago. Away from everybody and everything. A secluded cabin in Colorado seemed like the perfect place to hide out with his crushing grief. However before too long Thiago realizes that there is no escape. Not from his simmering rage, nor from his guilt, and not from the evil that’s hunting him and feeding off of his grief, determined to make its way into this world.

An original, bold horror book about loneliness, grief, and the oppressive intimacy of technology, and marks the arrival of a spectacular new talent.

The story is written in a very odd style, with Thiago narrating in the first person, with the reader piggybacking on a long conversation, almost like a confession at times, that he is having with Vera, his deceased wife. He’s wracked with guilt over the circumstances of her death, and he both reflects back to when she was still alive, while also telling the story in the present as he struggles to get on with his life.

Readers found this to be an intense cosmic horror with just a touch of Mexican American folklore that is both incredibly creepy and moving. This is a horror story of hair-raising hairpin curves. You’ll not be able to guess where this weird yet cool journey is taking you. The book is scary, funny, and truly heartbreaking. The narrative wraps the reader in its graceful prose which refuses to let you go until its striking ending. Gus has written a mighty fine novel that is visceral, unsettling, and a harrowing descent into madness, loss, and suffering.

There may be moments of reflection, peace, and humor scattered throughout this dark journey, this book casts a spell that readers are still attempting to shake off. “This Thing Between Us” isn’t a long novel by any means, but it is still able to cram a lot into its page count, with the first half setting the scene and the second upping the ante quite a lot, and is where things get pitch dark. The dead rise and blood is spilled, with some nods to other classic stories like “Cujo” and, more bizarrely “2001: A Space Odyssey”.