Is there an audiobook of Headlights?

Yes. Headlights has an Audible audiobook edition, narrated by Andrew Eiden.

How long is the Headlights audiobook?

The Headlights audiobook runs 12 hr 27 min.

Is Headlights on Kindle Unlimited?

No. Headlights was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on October 8, 2026.

Headlights by CJ Leede book cover for the Book of the Day horror book review

Our score

4.0/ 5

Excellent

Listen to Headlights free with an Audible trial Narrator, runtime & our audio review

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EDITION PUBLISHEDJune 2026

Genres

Fiction Horror Paranormal

Themes

Grief and lifelong traumaFacing a past you ran fromHuman violence and its costHaunted places and the shine

Headlights

Name: Headlights
Price: 14.99 USD
Availability: InStock
Author: CJ Leede

CJ Leede

Headlights by CJ Leede is a supernatural horror novel built on a crime case: a burned-out FBI agent is dragged back to Denver to explain people waking on a highway in a victim's skin. Gory, grief-soaked, and openly in debt to Stephen King, it offers dread with a heart.

The Review

Our take

Daniel Stansfield has one day left in the FBI and plans to spend it doing nothing. He left Denver in a hurry four years ago, and the job had been grinding him down well before that. Then a call pulls him back with the worst possible news: whatever he ran from has started up again. Ordinary people are coming to on the shoulder of a highway with no idea how they got there, dressed in a victim's skin, a stranger's hair knotted around the tongue. That image is the engine of this horror novel, and it's a good one. Grotesque, oddly specific, and impossible to file under a normal murder case.

For its first stretch, Headlights plays like a crime thriller with the lights off, all dread and procedure. Then it slides sideways. Daniel's childhood does the driving, along with a mother who named his sense for certain places and warned him off dismissing it. The shadows he sees turn out to have an explanation. The book unfolds in six parts across two timelines, the second built around Hannah, who shares his gift and carries a grief of her own. The chemistry between them is obvious, and the relationship stays messy. Readers split on whether it's moving or overcooked, which tells you how much risk Leede takes with it.

The setting pulls real weight. Colorado's front range, with its cold, its sprawl, and its predators at the edge of the suburbs, gives the story a believable chill, and the debt to Stephen King's The Shining is out in the open. A Stanley Hotel scene is the loudest nod. Borrowing at this volume is a gamble. It works best when Leede bends the material to personal ends and wobbles when the homage starts to feel like a remake. Then there is the Witchwalker, an interdimensional being given a backstory that is both sympathetic and frightening. It's the strongest idea in the book, and it gives the gore a reason to exist. Violence here is tied to grief, trauma, and what humanity does to the world and to itself.

The flaws are real. The early going takes a while to hook some readers, and the mystery only seems to lock in around the midpoint. The supernatural rules are loose, and a reader who wants to know what the magic can and can't do will be frustrated. A late turn toward environmental themes strikes some as arriving from nowhere. Exposition piles up. The back stretch sprawls, and a few readers feel the story forgets how to finish. The sex and cannibalism scenes are explicit enough to make some people laugh and others look away, so know your threshold going in.

Why you should read

Stephen King fans who like homage with gore
Supernatural horror with a crime-case frame
Grief and trauma woven into dread
Colorado settings and mountain-town menace

What to expect

Slow-building opening that tightens near the midpoint
Two timelines across six parts
Explicit gore, sex, and cannibalism
Loose rules for the supernatural
Bittersweet, hopeful ending

Does the ending honor its setup or cheat it? Mostly honored, though not where you'd bet. The final pages land bittersweet and hopeful, a choice that aims at the heart instead of the throat. Some readers expected something harder, and the mechanics of the solution are fuzzier than the emotional payoff. But all that suspicion the book builds, the second-guessing about what's real and who is responsible, ends up paying off in feeling. A murder case that finishes on hope is a strange place for horror to land. Here it holds.

Reviewed by Quinn · How our reviews are written

Our verdict

4.0/ 5

Excellent

Listen to Headlights free with an Audible trial Narrator, runtime & our audio review

Buy on Amazon

As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Prices may vary.

Where to read or listen

Is there an audiobook of Headlights?: Yes. Headlights has an Audible audiobook edition, narrated by Andrew Eiden.
Listen to Headlights free with an Audible trial
We earn from qualifying Amazon purchases.
How long is the Headlights audiobook?: The Headlights audiobook runs 12 hr 27 min.
Is Headlights on Kindle Unlimited?: No. Headlights was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on October 8, 2026.
How much does Headlights cost?: On Amazon: Kindle $14.99, Paperback $18.99, Hardcover $20.63. Prices as of October 13, 2026 at 2:21 AM EDT and may change.

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Common questions

What is Headlights about?: Daniel Stansfield has one day left in the FBI and plans to spend it doing nothing. He left Denver in a hurry four years ago, and the job had been grinding him down well before that. Then a call pulls him back with the worst possible news: whatever he ran from has started up again. Ordinary people…
Is Headlights worth reading?: We scored Headlights 4 out of 5. Headlights by CJ Leede is a supernatural horror novel built on a crime case: a burned-out FBI agent is dragged back to Denver to explain people waking on a highway in a victim's skin. Gory, grief-soaked, and openly in debt to Stephen King, it offers dread with a heart.