A solid collection that was missing nuance with some of the topics it tackled. Valencia is an imaginative and talented author, but in some cases felt stifled by the short story medium. I still enjoyed this and would read her future publications, but I wish this pushed the envelope a bit more! I've read several similar collections this year and while this was respectable, I think it had more potential than the execution suggests.

Mystery Lights was such a great read. I loved the character development in each story and the writing was propulsive. I would read more from this author.

Short stories gives readers a refreshing story each time they open the book and Mystery Lights is no exception. Mystery Lights gives us a new twist on horror and thriller short stories. The author doesn’t just focus on the typical horror tropes but gives us mundane daily life and subtle horror/thriller stories. Not every horror/thriller stories need to be bloody and Mystery Lights prove that.

⭐️⭐️⭐️.75

Thank you Netgalley and Tin House for sending me this ebook for review consideration.

I really love creepy, unsettling, feminist short story collections... so I really liked this! I felt like so many of the stories had a specific feeling to them, like each of the stories happened in the same environment to people in the same family. I can see this being annoying to some people but it really worked for me.

I will look for more works by this author. I would read a novel by them instantly.

Thank you NetGalley and Tin House for the ARC.

This is a wonderful collection! Exactly what I wanted from this much anticipated release. I can't wait to read Lena Valencia's next book. I hope it doesn't take 10 more years :)

Stories that will take the reader into the corners of being a woman in today's world, how magic and fabulism often collide with realism, and take us into new feelings and new territories. A must-read collection from a writer who knows how to keep the reader entertained!

I was gifted a copy of the ARC by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I read this book largely on a rainy day and the vibes were vibing! This collection of short stories has dark themes and is one story after another of foreboding. Speculative horror done very, very well. The narrators are often unreliable and selfish, the settings typically expansive and empty, and the repeated themes and symbols throughout the book left me thinking.

As a lover of short stories, one of my favorite formats, Mystery Lights by Lena Valencia was an absolute delight to read. This collection of short stories beautifully captures moments of quiet tension, subtle revelations, and the complexities of human connections, all wrapped in an atmospheric and slightly eerie tone that lingers long after you’ve finished each story.

Valencia has a gift for creating vivid snapshots of life, often set against haunting backdrops that feel both familiar and otherworldly. Each story feels like a small, self-contained universe, where the characters are so well-drawn that you can’t help but feel connected to their fears, hopes, and uncertainties. The writing is crisp, evocative, and brimming with an undercurrent of mystery that pulls you in from the first page.

While not every story hits the same emotional high, the collection as a whole is strong and showcases Valencia’s talent for crafting narratives that are both thought-provoking and engaging. The pacing is spot-on, with each piece offering just enough to leave you satisfied but still thinking about the characters and their choices.

Mystery Lights is a must-read for anyone who appreciates the art of the short story—a format that Valencia handles with great skill. This collection is perfect for readers who enjoy stories that explore the uncanny edges of everyday life, where the ordinary becomes tinged with something just a little strange and unforgettable. A solid four stars for a collection that masterfully balances the enigmatic with the deeply human.

Mystery Lights is a captivating collection of stories that intertwines the supernatural with everyday life, exploring themes like belief, fear, and human nature. Set in the American Southwest, the stories draw readers into eerie, atmospheric landscapes where unexplained phenomena coexist with very real human dilemmas. Valencia’s characters, often women at a crossroads, grapple with existential dread and supernatural mysteries, from ghost hunters on the verge of losing their connection to spirits, to women facing dangers both literal and metaphorical. The blend of horror, humor, and satire creates a unique tone, while the desert backdrop enhances the sense of isolation and intrigue. This collection not only delves into the supernatural but also critiques modern obsessions, such as self-improvement and social media, adding depth to its unsettling scenarios. I loved this one!

I really enjoyed this collection of short stories. Horror and Thriller are not my usual genres but every once in a while I want to read something spooky - this was perfect. The stories were very eerie and gave me that unsettled feeling I was looking for. This is the perfect read for spooky season!

- Dogs: 4/5 stars

- You Can Never Be Too Sure: 4/5 stars

- Mystery Lights: 3.5/5

- The White Places: 3/5 stars

- Bright Lights, Big Deal: 3/5 stars

- Trogloxene: 5/5 stars

- Reclamation: 4/5 stars

- Clean Hunters: 2/5 stars

- Reaper Ranch: 5/5 stars

- Vermillion: 4/5 stars

**Thank you to NetGalley and Tin House for the eARC of this amazing collection!**

I really enjoyed the stories in this collection, and found them all to be haunting in their own ways. As a big fan of short stories (especially horror, ) I appreciated the wide range of horrors that Valencia was able to bring to the page.

There is a huge difference between horrors in nature and horrors in humanity and I felt that this collection really dove in and explored this idea. I don't think I have an overall favorite story from this collection but see these stories being ones that I could reread again in a few months and enjoy even more the second time around.

Check this out if you enjoy short story collections, horror, scifi, and strong women!

I liked the idea for this short story collection a lot. From the blurb, the little snippets we get sounded really fascinating. And that cover is absolutely stunning. I was a little....let down by the actual reading experience of this as it felt like some of the stories had really well-realized themes and motifs where others just felt really random. I think that, averaged out, my overall reading experience for this book was around a 3-stars.

Mystery lights..i believe the premise of this anthology short story collection was a great idea but it had no central theme. Ok this about feminism..but what else? Some stuff made sense while others didn’t. Some stories stood out while others i couldn’t even tell you the greater meaning of. The cult one, the painter , dogs, and maybe 2 others made impressions on me.

3.5⭐️ Thank you to #netgalley & the publisher for the opportunity to review Mustery Lights. I was immediately pulled into the allure of this book by the cover and the promise of speculative horror leaning short stories. I loved the settings and the general vibes that the author portrayed in most her stories, which mostly took place in the desert. It gave me thoughts of Death Valley several times, a book I really enjoyed by M. Broder.

There is a lot of feminist symbolism, as most stories center women going through trials and tests, & how they overcome obstacles & relationships. It never felt scary to me, more like learning lessons along w/ the characters as weird stuff happens to them. They are meant to feel mysterious & most leave off without any kind of ending. However, some just felt really unfinished, or like they would be more suited for a novella. Saying that, I really did want most the stories to keep going as I was enjoying myself. There are ghost hunters, mysterious orbs, cave monsters, and some light horror elements thrown into a couple stories.

My favorite story overall was Reclamation, about a cult-like retreat for women who want to be thrive and be empowered. I'd read that full length novel for sure.

When books label themselves as 'feminist' from the get go, it's difficult to read them through a neutral lens. Claiming that label is heavy, as there are so many different things that can go wrong. Fortunately, Mystery Lights dodges some of the pitfalls we see with modern 'feminist' story collections. Valencia's writing is strong and quietly surrealist and odd throughout the collection, not leaving any particular story to shine above the rest.

Of the collection, I liked the titular Mystery Lights the most. To me, this captures the eerie feeling of the setting more than any of the other stories. Reclamation also stands out -- as someone who loves the beauty industry/wellness and horror intersection that has become popular in fiction, this was a great addition to the trope.

Dogs was another standout for me, though it is a little "on the nose" with its extended metaphor. Readers who are interested in exploring mother/daughter dynamics will like this one the most of the collection.

Altogether, I liked Lena Valencia's collection, and I would be interested in reading a full length novel from her in the future. If she chooses to stick to short fiction instead, I hope she explores some more unique themes.

Lena Valencia’s debut short story collection, Mystery Lights, is sure to appeal to fans of Karen Russell’s short fiction and anyone overwhelmed with the everyday horrors of contemporary life.

The star of the show in the ten stories presented in this collection is Valencia’s narrative voice. So frequently when I read horror or speculative fiction, I find myself loving the concepts and being disappointed in the execution or craft. This could not be further from the truth in the case of this book—Valencia’s prose eases the reader into the worlds that she creates, and is wonderfully atmospheric and strange without being suffocating.

I found myself gravitating towards the longer stories in this collection, where the reader has more time to get to know the characters and really explore their situations. Valencia also tends to embrace nuance a bit more in her longer pieces, which I really appreciate in speculative fiction and horror. In general, I LOVED the things that Valencia explored with respect to nature and setting (lots of very atmospheric descriptions of barren deserts and mysterious woods), and found her character work and thematic subtlety to pale a bit in comparison.

The collection as a whole approaches its topics from a feminist angle that meshes really nicely with the environmental context (à la Georgia O’Keefe), but it did sometimes feel like Valencia was a bit too forward about connecting the social background of her work to her in-story analogues and metaphors. Because of this, there were a handful of stories that I really loved up until the last few pages, where the tone would shift from eerie and subtle into somewhat obvious and outlandish, often with the effect of making the commentary or meaning come across as a bit shallow. Some of this feels like the common pitfalls of an author finding their narrative voice and continuing to perfect their craft, and I’m really excited to see where Valencia goes in her future work.

My last comment is that I do think that this collection suffers somewhat from being mis-marketed as horror, when it really isn’t. There is a general sense of unease in many of the stories, but it feels more accurate to label this as speculative fiction or magical realism, and I do think that I would have enjoyed it more had I gone into it with different expectations.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tin House for the e-ARC of this collection in exchange for my honest review.

The title, cover, and publisher’s synopsis of this short story collection and after reading, I have mixed feelings as most landed in the middle of the road. The stories seem to have great premises and started well enough, but didn’t conclude with satisfying results (at least not for me). In some cases, there was quite a bit of telling instead of showing. I kept hoping that each new story would deliver, but most left me wanting more. Although billed as “horror,” I’d say more so strange or eerie as I didn’t particularly find any of them scary.

Thanks to the publisher, Tin House, and NetGalley for an opportunity to review.

Lena Valencia's debut collection, Mystery Lights, is full of trouble. Everyone is in trouble, particularly girls and women who find themselves on the precipice of the dangerous and uncanny as soon as they step beyond their familiar routines. Shifting power lies at the center of many stories. Whenever that dynamic changes, even the most confident, accomplished women find themselves grappling with forces beyond understanding. And not all of those forces belong to the uncanny. Valencia’s depictions of the inner lives of young women and the difficulties between mothers and daughters always lie beneath the surface and are as challenging as a pack of feral, possibly otherworldly dogs.

Fascinating, eerie, unexpectedly gripping set of short stories. I especially loved the one that was so clearly inspired by Georgia O'Keeffe and her "young man" Juan Hamilton.

Mystery Lights by Lena Valencia to my understanding was supposed to be a feminist short story collection and either I don’t understand feminism or the stories aren’t what they were described to be. Example is feminism a young girl living in New York in a bedbug infested room with no regard for her roommates, who really is doing nothing with her life and lives off of her parent’s or maybe feminism is getting pregnant for a man 20 years older that happens to be your mom‘s employers boyfriend or maybe the viewpoint of the painter who wants to pay for her boarding school to get her out of town or whatever she wants as long as she leaves and the painter can have Mike. The premise of a lot of these stories had great starts but found the ending was just wherever the author thought to end a story because it wasn’t like a mic drop a big bang or any situation where you put the book down and are like wow that was a good story. They just ended and went on to the next story. Because I liked the oracle about the painter and the young girl so much I’m giving this three stars I always pick a favorite story in a collection and that one was mine at least for this book it was I do think the writing was good but most characters weren’t the most ethical let alone likable and I totally get what she was putting down but I DK I just think the storys could’ve been better or maybe it was all the hype about it being feminist that was a letdown but if you were looking for short stories about people living their lives you may enjoy this one.#TinHouse, #NetGalley, #LenaValencia, #MysteryLights,