Culture Crash: Is King Sorrow Worth Reading? Inside Joe Hill’s Newest Novel

Author Joe Hill is known for his creepy tales of horror and discontent. He wrote the source material for the Netflix show Locke & Key, the 2013 movie Horns, and the Black Phone movies starring Ethan Hawke. He’s been publishing his work for decades now, but Joe Hill’s newest novel, King Sorrow, may just be his best work yet.

King Sorrow is an 896-page behemoth of a book that tells the fantastical and unfortunate story of a group of college students who mess with a divine power they don’t fully understand and unleash a mystical and evil dragon upon the world. Hill seamlessly guides audiences through decades of story, changing perspective from one fully realized character to another, keeping things fresh but always returning to his central themes of sacrifice and friendship.

King Sorrow is a horror novel full of dark humor, mythical fantasy, thrilling sequences, and a true reckoning with how our society has changed in the past 40 years. Hill weaves a number of news headlines, social evolutions, and technological breakthroughs into his narrative, emphasizing just how fast everything seems to be evolving. In a digital era full of AI tools and efficiency markers, of what use are Faustian bargains and fairy tales?

Brimming with memorable characters, clever writing, and a number of situations beyond my most nightmarish imagination, King Sorrow is an immersive roller-coaster of a story and a journey I’m sure I’ll go on again.