The fall, PS Publishing will ship their deluxe, signed, expanded edition of King Sorrow, limited to just a 1,000 copies. I haven’t been this excited for a limited since PS Publishing released my first book, 20th Century Ghosts, way back in 2005 (publisher Pete Crowther took a chance on that collection after all the big boys in NYC and London turned it down and don’t think I’ve ever forgot it).
The first draft of King Sorrow was over 300,000 words long, making it a very, very long book, and I went into the second draft with a remit to cut 10%. I trimmed 15,000 words pretty easily. The next seven or eight thousand was harder—I clipped out a lot of grace notes, a whole mess of banter, and a handful of scenes that I liked but that felt less than essential. And then I was still about 7,000 words short. One afternoon I realized I could cut out a whole subplot about one of my six heroes, Donovan McBride, and no one would ever miss it.
Except me.
I hated to do it but I clenched my teeth and went in with the scalpel. The subplot came out and the patient survived the operation.
To my great delight, the PS edition restores that 7,500 word side quest as it was originally written—it’s been stitched back into the text with as much finesse as I could manage.
That’s not all: in addition to Alan Dingman’s glorious endpapers, cover, and interior art, the PS Limited features Alan’s extraordinary sprayed edge, which shows my titular dragon threading himself through the pages of the book. The sprayed edge was originally going to be a part of the William Morrow hardcover… and we had to drop it when we realized it would push the price point of the book uncomfortably high. I was sorry to see it go—it was an ingenious design—and grateful William Morrow was able to offer PS Publishing the use of it.
PS is taking preorders now. If you’re able to snag a copy, I hope it’s an absolute delight.
For the release of King Sorrow in the U.K., I moved over to the Headline imprint, sister company to my former British publisher, Gollancz, and they did a bang-up job of releasing my dragon into the wild—it’s been my most successful U.K. hardcover by a long stick.
Now they’ve begun the process of repackaging and rereleasing my entire backlist in paperback, beginning with these two beauts:
It’s all a part of Headline’s run up to the autumn paperback release of King Sorrow, featuring this smokier, slightly charred revamp of the original cover:
My Dad and I visited The Last Podcast on the Left for a special Father’s Day conversation and we all had a pretty good gab session about writing, horror, and parenting. Go ahead and give it a listen on your next commute—or check it out on Netflix if for some reason you actually wanna look at our faces. Hosts Marcus, Henry, and Ed are always great fun.
• I’ll be in Avilés, Spain, for the legendary Celsius 232 Festival of the Fantastic this July, where I’ll be amidst a whole parade of remarkable genre scribes, including Joe Abercrombie (The Devils), Christopher Buehlman (Between Two Fires), and Sarah Waters (The Little Stranger! One of my all-time favorite ghost stories!). Spoiler: this might not be my only European visit in 2026. But it’s the one I’m doing this summer. Looking forward to it.
• I dug this Collider list of the ten best Blumhouse pictures, which happened to include The Black Phone among the freaky finalists. I also noticed it wasn’t director Scott Derrickson and co-writer C. Robert Cargill’s only entry on the list. Oh, and hey, in related news, now is not the time to let your Netflix subscription lapse. At last glance, you could find The Black Phone, The Black Phone 2, In The Tall Grass, Locke & Key, and both seasons of NOS4A2 over there. Ta-da? More like Ta-Dum.
This was supposed to be the June newsletter, but I just had a glance at the calendar, and it appears to have become July while I wasn’t paying attention. I’m scratchin’ around for more to tell you, but I think that’s about all I’ve got.
I’m sailing into the middle of the summer with The Savage, Noble Death of Babs Dionne by Ron Currie to keep me company. I’m only about halfway through, but it’s already a strong contender for the best thing I’ve read this year (although it’ll have it’s work cut out to slip by Patrick Radden Keefe’s London Falling). It also might be the best book ever written about Maine that isn’t by Stephen King, John Irving, or Richard Russo.
My wife and I blew through Widow’s Bay and can only say, “more please.” Speaking of Stephen King, Widow’s Bay might be my favorite Stephen King adaptation since The Long Walk (which is just about to hit HBO if you haven’t caught it yet). I’m kidding—but only sort of. It really is a very loving exploration of a single basic high concept: what if everything Stephen King ever wrote about Maine was true?
I caught Backrooms in mid-June and was unnerved and a little intoxicated by it. Between Backrooms, Widow’s Bay, and Keith Rosson’s novels, I’m feeling both inspired and challenged—the genre has never produced so much work at this high a level and I wanna be right there in the thick of it, if I can manage.
My book-a-year plan is off to more like a book-every-two-years start. All I can tell you is that Hunger is done in second draft, chugging pleasantly along through the next editorial steps, and I’m at work on a new novel. I wrapped up a screenplay—the first time I’ve ever adapted someone else’s work!—and will likely be on to another adaptation in the fall.
New Hampshire is air frying this week under the heat lamp of the sun and when I’m out in the Defender, I’ve got the windows down and the sound system blasting that new Mumford & Sons album—with occasional breaks to listen to Fantastic Cat. If you spend too much time looking at the internet, you can get almost dizzy with outrage and despair… but I’m not inclined to feel the things the algorithm wants me to feel. Don’t you fall for it, either, okay?
Here’s hoping you’re happy and well and have a good book close at hand. There’ll be another Escape Hatch before July is over.
Joe Hill, Exeter, NH, July 1st.
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