About Audrey

My mom let me watch The X-Files when I was far too young for it, and she taught me to read like it was a competitive sport. Between the two of them I was hooked. I've been going down rabbit holes ever since.

The Mystery Files is where I put what I find. Some of it is true crime. A lot of it isn't crime at all, just strange and impossible to leave alone.

What keeps me reading is the not-knowing. We have DNA now, and there's a camera over every door. These cases should all be solvable. Some of them just aren't.

I work when my house is asleep, which means before the sun is up or long after everyone else has given up on the day. I have an office and an unreasonable amount of coffee.

And for the record, I don't spend all of my time in the dark. I'm in a dance group with a bunch of women in their thirties and forties, and I have other hobbies. But I always get drawn back to the files.

Audrey Valez is a pen name. I write about people who hurt other people and about the ones who were never caught, and I have a family I'd like to keep well clear of that. It's the only thing on this website that isn't literally true. The cases are real, the research is real, and so is the part where I can't sleep.

Pull up a chair. The next file is already open on my desk.