S20 Ep108: Fiend: Supernatural Secrets in Business, Family, and Tragedy w/Alma Katsu

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4.8 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 9 September 2025

⏱️ 163 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

True Crime Tuesday presents: Fiend: Supernatural Secrets in Business, Family, and Tragedy with Ex-CIA Agent/Author, Alma Katsu!

Imagine if the Sackler family had a demon at their beck and call.

The Berisha family runs one of the largest import-export companies in the world, and they’ve always been lucky. Their rivals suffer strokes. Inconvenient buildings catch on fire. Earthquakes swallow up manufacturing plants, destroying harmful evidence. Things always seem to work out for the Berishas. They’re blessed.

At least that is what Zef, the patriarch, has always told his three children. And each of them knows their place in the family—Dardan, as the only male heir, must prepare to take over as keeper of the Berisha secrets, Maris’s most powerful contribution, much to her dismay, will be to marry strategically, and Nora’s job, as the youngest, is to just stay out of the way. But when things stop going as planned, and the family blessing starts looking more like a curse, the Berishas begin to splinter, each hatching their own secret scheme. They didn’t get to be one of the richest families in the world without spilling a little blood, but this time, it might be their own.

On Today's TCT, We sit down with Alma Katsu to talk about her background in the CIA, how the agency has changed in today's times and threats, and then we launch into the Berisha family! What makes them tick, What makes their moral code "questionable", and what sets them all up to be perfect to carry the "family Secret"!

Get your copy of "Fiend" here: https://www.amazon.com/Fiend-Alma-Katsu/dp/0593714342

Learn more about Alma here: https://almakatsubooks.com/

PLUS DUMB CRIMES AND STUPID CRIMINALS W/JESSICA FREEBURG!

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome in everybody to the best in true crime podcasting.
0:25.8	This is True Crime Tuesday.
0:26.8	I'm your host Tim Dennis.
0:28.2	Really excited about today's show, folks.
0:30.3	I had the privilege of reading a thriller this weekend.
0:33.8	I'm going to hold it up for you there on video.
0:35.5	There it is.
0:36.1	It is called Fiend.
0:37.2	My guest today is Alma Katsu. And I'm going to hold it up for you there on video. There it is. It is called Fiend. My guest today is Alma Katsu.
0:39.4	And I'm going to be a little vague today.
0:42.0	But I'll tell you why it's got a plot that is incredibly interesting.
0:47.9	It involves the world of business.
0:49.6	It involves a family from Albania.
0:52.9	And a plot that I'll read it directly from the cover here and I'll quote
1:00.5	Grady Hendricks the author of witchcraft for Wayward Girls if you like succession but think it
1:06.5	would have been a lot more fun with a thousand-year-old demon than Fiend has got you covered.
1:13.7	That's what it says on the front of the cover.
1:15.9	Now, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll, let that hang for a moment.
1:22.1	And I'll tell you a little bit about our guest today.
1:26.6	And, boy, you know, even just telling you about our guest today, I think we'll get you
1:32.9	excited.
1:34.4	Al-Mekatsu is one of a kind and is someone who I think you're going to really enjoy hearing from today and love talking to.
	...

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