The monster in Clay McLeod Chapman’s next novel is a classroom CPR dummy. Tor Nightfire publishes Mr. Lonelyhearts on March 23, 2027, in hardcover, ebook and audio.
The story follows a teenager named Jenn and her friends, who call themselves the Cöven, after they carry the dummy home from a seventh-grade health class and name him Mr. Lonelyhearts. Years later, when a breakup leaves Jenn on her own, he comes back on his own terms. Tor Nightfire bills the book as a supernatural slasher about loneliness and toxic attachment.
His Last Novel Is Becoming a Screen Gems Movie
Chapman has a Bram Stoker Award and a shelf of horror novels behind him, among them Ghost Eaters, Devil Inside and Wake Up and Open Your Eyes. Screen Gems is developing Ghost Eaters as a feature, with Maggie Levin directing and Scott Derrickson producing.
He writes for the screen as well. Chapman co-wrote The Restoration at Grayson Manor with Glenn McQuaid, which premiered at Fantastic Fest in 2025, and he wrote the horror podcast Quiet Part Loud with Mac Rogers. He teaches writing at the Actors Studio MFA Program at Pace University.
Early Praise Calls It a Nightmare on Paper
Christopher Golden calls the novel “the closest thing to a nightmare on paper,” and Thomas Olde Heuvelt describes it as “razor-sharp, wildly entertaining, and deeply unsettling.” Preorders are open now, which gives the Cöven four months to regret ever bringing him home.
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