New Story By Joe Hill In November
Posted: February 26, 2026, 19:34
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NEWS - JOE HILL
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Joe Hill Reads Lilja's Library
Posted: February 2, 2026, 19:08
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Hill Working On A Script and Hunger Pushed To March 2, 2027
Posted: February 2, 2026, 16:15
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I’m closing in on the latest rewrite of this screenplay (adapted from a still-unpublished-but-it’ll-be-out-someday novella of mine).
He's also updating us on his next book Hunger:
I’m also elbow deep in what will probably be the last major rewrite of Hunger (although there will inevitably be at least two more lighter revisions).
HarperCollins announced Hunger, complete with a pretty good sketch of what the thing is about. There’s also a release date, but I wouldn’t Sharpie that on your calendar just yet, I kinda got a feeling it’s gonna get bumped to early 2027. (Hey! I said I’d finish a book a year, I didn’t promise anything about publication dates, which is somewhat out of my control).
The release date for Hunger on HarperCollins website has now been changed to March 2, 2027.
A 25,000 Words Longer King Sorrow?
Posted: February 2, 2026, 15:59
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After my editor, Jen Brehl, and some other early readers had a look at the second draft of King Sorrow, it became clear to me that it would be best for the book, commercially if not creatively, to cut 25,000 words. In the end I had to make some hard choices. One of the things I had to clip out was a whole suspenseful subplot about Donovan McBride on Cherokee Island and his not-so-meticulous escape plan. It just about killed me to clip it out, but I saw that it could be excised cleanly, and no one would sense the loss of it. So that was 6,500 words right there.
I had cause to think of it the other day, because while I can’t announce anything just yet (there’s nothing to announce), there might be a future limited edition in which I’m able to put that material back into the narrative. We’ll see. Seems to me that could be pretty cool.
The prospect of restoring one of Van’s best moments to King Sorrow got me looking back on the other things I had to clip out, stuff that’s kind of wild to think about now. In several early drafts, when we first meet Arthur Oakes, he isn’t living with his best friend Van in off-campus housing… he was living with his aunt and uncle, who both had jobs at the school. Yeah, that’s right: Reverend Erin Oakes had a sister! Aunt Kate was a big character too. My mom was especially attached to her, and had real concerns about the way she disappeared from the last third of the novel… I remember my ma wrote me a few hundred words, sketching out what I might do with her.
I hadn’t noticed the way Aunt Kate disappeared from the last third of the book until my mom mentioned it… but that was a good cue that I didn’t need her. She had to go, and that was another 6,500 words.
I fought harder to keep something else: once upon a time, Gwen used to be a smoker. To be specific, she was a pipe smoker. Her father was too, and it was her habit to finish her day by smoking a pipe with him out on the front step. That pipe followed her throughout the story and often appeared at moments of high drama. I remember she banged it down in frustration, in Part I, when her friends were talking about pooling their money to pay off the Nighswanders. Years later, when Gwen is in fairly desperate straits, she goes out on the back step of her house with Robin Fellows and has a pipe while they talk about her options.
It’s a weird but true thing that when I attended John Bapst in Bangor, Maine, several of the girls had corn cob pipes, and would whip them out for a sneaky smoke when teachers weren’t around. I found that indescribably cool and, while working on King Sorrow, it seemed like a little random bit of Maine cultural history worth preserving.
My wife and my U.S. editor didn’t agree with me and one or both of my parents found it a totally valueless affectation. I was dragged kicking and screaming but in the end the pipe went. Maybe if we ever get a TV adaptation (hey! I’m allowed to daydream!) we’ll get the pipe back, but probably not. Although smoking was fairly ubiquitous in the 1980s, you won’t see a single ciggy in The Black Phone movies. Our distributor, Universal, wouldn’t have it. Gwen’s pipe, that was maybe 500 words. More? Maybe more. That pipe kept busy.
If you’re doing the math, you’ve probably realized this tally only gets me to about 14,000 words, and I needed to cut 25,000. Where’d I get the rest? Well, I just made a rule for myself that I was going to cut one sentence from every page, no exceptions. Sometimes I’d get two, or more, but never less than one. I also hacked conversations down to the bare minimum (there is always too much banter in my early drafts). I got there. Barely. And the good news is the psychic wounds have almost healed!
Hill’s Hunger Out On October 13
Posted: January 18, 2026, 01:14
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A new novel about the battle for a country's survival — and a malevolent, murderous ghost hell-bent on consuming souls.
They’re starving in Boston.
It’s the winter of 1776, and the besieged city is running perilously low on supplies. First the American rebels penned in the British soldiers, then frostbite sank its teeth into the city, and now a ravenous ghost has come to feed on the trapped and desperate colonists who remain loyal to the Crown. Morale is low enough among the besieged British troops without a fiend tempting men with a sumptuous feast of roast meat, pastries, puddings, and pies. It’s a spread many would sell their souls for…which is exactly the deal on offer. As the ghoul’s withered victims pile up, and panic spreads, British General Howe takes action: he orders Captain Amos Crowe to expel the fiend by any means necessary. It is an impossible order. But it’s far from the only impossibility in Crowe’s horrifying New World. For the dead have been speaking to him ever since he was injured at the Battle of Bunker Hill. And now, he must track down a witch hidden deep behind enemy lines, a woman who, it is rumored, holds the key to defeating the evil spirit. A fast-paced and immersive historical yarn from Joe Hill, master of the supernatural fable, this gripping story weaves its way through the heart of the American Revolution as told through British eyes, capturing the spirit of the age in all its high passion, opportunity, and terror.
The book will have 432 pages (according to Amazon) and you can pre-order your copy here.
Hunger Update
Posted: December 11, 2025, 16:47
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My Interview With Joe Hill
Posted: November 3, 2025, 15:28
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Here is my inteview with Joe Hill. In it we talk about his new book King Sorrow, his upcoming book Hunger and Stephen King among other things.Yeah, so Hunger is in one sense the kind of story I feel very comfortable writing. It’s a ghost story and it’s very much a horror novel. In some way the last third of the book is THE most horror novel I have ever written, you know the most, goes the deepest into the sort of horror genre. In another sense though it’s way outside my comfort zone.
The Day I Met Joe Hill
Posted: November 1, 2025, 23:47
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On Thursday (I was scheduled to meet him on Friday at 4:30 PM), I set out to get my copy, and I thought that Forbidden Planet, where I would meet up with him the day after, would be a great place to get a copy of the book. I would also get a chance to check out the place so I’d know where I was going and what it looked like the next day. Well, that was what I thought. Once I got there, I couldn’t find the book in the store anywhere, and I thought it must be me looking in the wrong place. The man is scheduled to be there the next day to sign his book. He can’t do that if they don’t have the book, right? Well, I asked a gentleman who worked there if they had it, and he went to look for it. When he came back, he said, “Sorry, but I can’t sell you the book. There is a signing tomorrow between 5 PM and 7 PM, and then after that we will sell any leftovers that we have, so you can come back then.”
Well, OK, I thought. I can understand that they want to have books in stock for everyone that had bought a ticket for the signing, which I hadn’t. But I didn’t sweat it. London is huge and filled with bookstores. I was sure I’d find one that had the book.
During the rest of that day I didn’t run into a single bookstore that had the book, and I started to get stressed out. I couldn’t miss the chance to get a book signed in person when I was meeting Joe Hill. So that evening I went online, and at Waterstones on Piccadilly I found one. I ordered it for Click & Collect, and a couple of hours later I got an email that the book was ready for me to pick up.
During Friday I did a bit of sightseeing and happened to run into another Waterstones bookstore. I decided to see if the book was available there, and if so, I could buy it there, cancel my other one, and save me the extra trip to collect it. They had one copy in the back that they got for me after almost five minutes of searching for it. Only problem with that was that it was already signed. Good thing I noticed. It would have been strange to arrive with a book already signed by Joe, asking him to sign it. So, on my way to Forbidden Planet, I stopped by Waterstones at Piccadilly, and thank God they had the book. It wasn’t already signed, and they allowed me to buy it. With the book in hand, I headed for Forbidden Planet and my meeting with Joe. Of course, it started to rain the second I stepped outside the bookstore. But I was prepared. I had my umbrella, and I had my plastic bag to put the book in, and both I and the book arrived safely.
I had gotten instructions from Caitlin from Joe’s publisher to wait by the main entrance at 4:15, and she would come and get me. I was there by 4:13 and waited. By 4:20 I was still waiting and got a bit nervous that I had gotten it wrong and was supposed to wait somewhere else. I texted her, and she said Joe hadn’t arrived yet, but that she would come and get me as soon as he had. Puh, I was at the right place, I was at the right spot, and at the right time. So, I waited. After a while I heard a familiar voice. “Should I just go down there? OK.” When I looked up, it was Joe himself entering the store like any shopper would, checking where he was supposed to be with the clerk, and then went past me and down one floor. It felt so unreal that I didn’t even react. I just looked at him as he passed. And in fact, no one else seemed to realize that Joe Hill had just passed them. Very strange. I waited some more, but now I wasn’t nervous that I was in the wrong place — now I started to get a bit nervous that there wouldn’t be time for me to interview him before he was due upstairs to sign books for everyone that was lining up.
While I waited, I met some people I knew and some I didn’t know before but got to know then, and then it was time. Caitlin fetched me, and we went downstairs and into a backroom where I was told to wait — Joe was on his way.
When he arrived, there were also a few of the staff with him carrying books. Those were the staff’s books that Joe was asked to sign, and he did. I quickly understood that Joe is one of those authors that really takes the time to sign a book — he doesn’t just scribble his name and be done with it. I didn’t see what he wrote, but I did see that he took the time to sign and dedicate each and every one of the books. Just like we fans want it. Then it was my turn. My turn to interview Joe Hill face to face.
READ THE INTERVIEW HERE
The interview went great, and Joe answered all my questions, and not once, even though there were a lot of fans waiting to get their books signed one floor up, did Joe feel stressed or make me feel like I had to hurry up with my questions. He took the time to answer everything, and he was a joy to interview.
Once I was done, I asked if he had time to sign my copy of King Sorrow, which he did. As with all the other copies I saw him sign, he didn’t just sign his name but also wrote a great inscription and he drew a dragon. After that we took a picture, I thanked him for everything, and he went upstairs to sign books and chat with his fans for two hours. I can only hope that all of you had the same good experience as I did.
Big thanks to Joe and Caitlin for making this happen. I really appreciate it.
Hill On CBS Morning Show
Posted: October 26, 2025, 01:31
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Joe Hill on CBS Morning show.
Loads Of Updates From Joe Hill
Posted: October 12, 2025, 17:30
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Joe revealed that the first story his dad wrote for him was called something like Joe and Naomi in the Fart Cookies of Death. My guess is that it was The King Family and the Wicked Witch that involves a witch that begins farting so explosively that she blows herself to the moon. The first real Stephen King book he read was IT and that he read it in manuscript form that was about 200 pages longer than the finished book.As for Joe’s upcoming publication there are a lot to look forward to. Besides King Sorrow who was called both Coil and Serpentine in early stages Joe revealed that a limited edition of the book will be out in 2 volumes from PS Publishing in the future and in that edition, he hopes to be able to include a major subplot with Donovan McBride that he cut from the original version of the book.
He also confirmed that his next book will be called Hunger and revealed that it will be out in October 2026 if everything goes as planned. b>Hunger is a historical ghost novel taking place in the 18th century and he’s been doing research for it for the last 7 years.And as if that isn’t enough, he has two more books that he is working on as well as a finished novella that probably will be released as an illustrated stand-alone book. Joe has also written a screenplay based on that same novella.
And, to make things even better Joe reveals that the plan for the next 10 years is to release 1 book and 1 screenplay a year for the next 10 years. This means we will have a lot more to read from Joe up until 2035, at least.
Check out the entire interview over at The Loser’s Club podcast. It’s really worth a listening.
Narrator Of King Sorrow
Posted: October 11, 2025, 12:48
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Ari Fliakos will be the primary narrator of King Sorrow but there will also be some ensemble bits that are more like an audio play. Ian Shaw will do the voice of King Sorrow.
My Thoughts On King Sorrow
Posted: October 9, 2025, 14:50
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Here are my thoughs about King Sorrow by Joe Hill out on October 21st.Having finished the book, I realize how much I’ve missed Hill’s books. I know he has released a few collections and short stories over the years, but a full novel is something else entirely.
We Have A Dragon Winner!
Posted: October 1, 2025, 08:45
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The question was:
Joe Hill has written two short stories with his father Stephen King. Name the title of one of them.
The answer is:
Throttle, published in He Is Legend in 2009.
In the Tall Grass, published in Esquire in 2012.
Both stories can also be found in Joe’s collection Full Throttle from 2019 so if you haven’t read them, order the book here and do that now. In the Tall Grass can also be found as a feature film on Netflix.
And now to the winner. From over 1,000 entries I have drawn one winner. This person gave the correct answer and followed me on social media as required and will now receive an ARC (Advanced Readers Copy) of Joe Hill’s upcoming book King Sorrow, signed by Joe.
The winner is Will Steven from the US. Now, I know this is a fairly common name so before you get all excited let me tell you that I have been in touch with the right Will and if I haven’t been in touch with you even though your name is Will Steven you are not the winner.
With that said, congratulations to Will and a HUGE thanks to Headline, Joe Hill and all of you that entered the contest.
Writing Books On A Typewriter
Posted: September 24, 2025, 09:47
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It’s no secret to regular readers of Escape Hatch that I’m in some kind of managed retreat from the 21st Century. I try to keep the median temperature in my office set to about 1976. I mostly skip streaming my music and opt for vinyl. I don’t bring the cell phone in the office, if I can help it. And I wrote all of The Fireman longhand in a bunch of massive ledgers.But I don’t know if I can work that way and get a novel done every year. So, just in the last couple months, I’ve shifted over to writing my first drafts on the typewriter instead of the computer. It’s the happy spot halfway between scrawling a story on parchment with a raven’s feather and using some bloated piece of word processing software.
If you even want to call working on the typewriter “writing” at all. In the time since I’ve shifted over, I’ve hardly felt like I was writing at all. It’s more like driving nails—or squeezing the trigger on a nail-gun. The steel keys on my Olivetti go chomp-chomp-chomp and eat up the page and a while later I’ve got another 1600 words. No going back to fix things. No second thoughts.
I’ve got a whole stack of functioning typewriters, and I thought I’d rotate them between pieces, see how it goes. I’ve got a frail Selectric III (with a fancy-pants innovation: Correct-Tape!), a robust olive-colored Selectric II, and the one I’m using currently, my blood-red Olivetti, a 60-year-old manual. So far it seems like there might still be some good words left in this antique. Whether I refer here to the machine or the man sitting behind it, I leave you to decide.
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The Black Phone 2, Trailer #2
Posted: September 8, 2025, 08:15
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Excerpt From King Sorrow
Posted: August 30, 2025, 09:42
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USA TODAY has the first exclusive excerpt from Joe Hill’s King Sorrow (out Oct. 21), which takes places over 25 years beginning in 1989 and follows six friends who strike a deal with a dragon to protect them, though that deal pays a bloody toll over time.Check out the excerpt here.
My Thoughts On Abraham’s Boys
Posted: July 11, 2025, 10:02
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Here are my thoughts of Abraham's Boys based on Joe Hill's story with the same name.Abraham’s Boys offers a very different take on vampires and the legendary vampire hunter Van Helsing—but a good one. However, if you’re expecting a lot of neck biting and blood pouring all over the screen, you’ll be disappointed. This is not that kind of movie.
Poster: Joe Hill's Abraham's Boys
Posted: June 12, 2025, 14:21
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Trailer For Abraham's Boys
Posted: June 10, 2025, 22:00
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Trailer & Poster For The Black Phone 2
Posted: June 3, 2025, 00:41
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The Black Phone 2 Teaser
Posted: June 1, 2025, 02:03
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Teaser for Joe Hill’s The Black Phone 2. Link posted by Joe himself on Threads and since the movies title isn’t shown a few people asked if this was a fan made teaser and it’s not according to Joe.
Joe Hill’s Next Novel Is Hunger
Posted: April 19, 2025, 02:22
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Time To Order!
Posted: March 18, 2025, 10:16
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Stephen King:
Never Flinch (May 27)
Hansel & Gretel (September 2)
Joe Hill:
Jackknife (April 15)
King Sorrow (October 21)
Owen King
Letter Slot (April 15)
Jackknife: New Kindle Story By Joe Hill
Posted: March 17, 2025, 20:32
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King Sorrow & More To Come From Joe Hill
Posted: March 17, 2025, 15:48
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I'm reading the book as we speak and trust me, you don't want to miss this one.
In his recent newsletter Joe also mentions that he's almost finished with yet another book and that he aims for one new book / year for a few years to come.
I’m in the home stretch on a new novel and have (possibly unfounded) hopes of finishing by the end of the month. It always takes longer than I think it’s going to. Still: I remain optimistic that I might be able to stay on track for a book a year for the next few years. Wouldn’t that be cool?
Joe Hill’s Abraham’s Boys Becomes A Feature Film
Posted: March 9, 2025, 00:11
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Joe Hill’s short story Abraham’s Boys from the collection 20th Century Ghosts has been turned into a feature film staring Titus Welliver (Bosch). In April it will premier on the Overlook Film Festival. Hill will be there and for a wide-ranging career conversation to discuss the methods behind the madness which animate his exquisite body of work.
