I'm Natalie Moore. I fell in love with soap operas when I was just five years old, and I still

watch them. Their television's longest scripted series and have zero reruns. Now let me tell you,

soap operas aren't just some silly art form. They are significant. In this season of making,

Stories Without End from WBEZ Chicago.

Join me as I share how the genre began, their social impact, and why these stories endure.

Listen, wherever you get your podcast.

From WBEZ Chicago, I'm Greta Johnson, and this is The Nerd at Book Club.

It's just like a regular book club, except if you're too scared to turn the page, we already did it for you.

This month's selection is Gus Moreno's terrifying book, this thing between us.

It's a horror novel.

It's told from the point of view of Tiago, who is mourning the loss of his wife Vera from an accident at a train station. Even before Vera died, eerie things are happening in their Chicago condo. Their smart speaker may or may not be possessed by an evil spirit, but after her death, everything just keeps getting weirder. That's all I'm going to say for the sake of spoilers. Gus is here with us now. Gus, welcome to Nourdet. Thank you for having me.

Okay, so I feel like we have to start by knowing, do you have a smart speaker?

I do, yes. You do. Wow. You trust it with your life then, huh?

You know, I don't trust. I don't know if i trust it with my

life but i do have to like admit it did give me the idea of like uh writing a horror novel about

smart speakers so it's not all the way bad that's so funny so it was like that was the the kind

of grain the seed that you grew this book from, was that concept?

Yeah, it was literally me asking my Amazon Echo something. And I was a little bit under the

influence. So when she responded to me, it was like a different response that I was not

expecting and it scared the hell out of me. So I was like, oh, this is

something. I have to do this. Oh my God. That's amazing. Do you remember what you asked her?

No, I don't. I have, it may have been like the weather or something. And she just went on a long

...