Colleen Hoover, Stephen King and Other Horror Novels Coming to Film

Ed GrossSun, July 26, 2026 at 12:30 AM UTC

0

Clockwise from left: Getty Images, Sperling & Kupfer, Getty Images, Vintage

One of the biggest trends sweeping through Hollywood these days is the adaptation of bestselling novels into movies and television series. Romance readers have seen everything from Emily Henry's People We Meet on Vacation to Rebecca Yarros' Fourth Wing headed for the screen, and now horror fans are finally getting their turn. From Stephen King's enduring classics to Colleen Hoover's psychological thriller Verity and a host of chilling newcomers, here's a look at seven horror and horror-adjacent novels that are officially making the leap from page to screen adaptations.

1. 'Verity' (2018)

VerityGrand Central Publishing

Author: Colleen Hoover

What it’s about: Struggling writer Lowen Ashleigh is hired to complete a bestselling series after acclaimed author Verity Crawford is left unable to write following a mysterious accident. As Lowen settles into the family's secluded home, she discovers an unpublished manuscript filled with chilling confessions that raise unsettling questions about whether Verity's darkest thoughts might actually be true.

Adaptation status: Amazon MGM Studios' film adaptation stars Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson and Josh Hartnett. Directed by Michael Showalter, it is scheduled for theatrical release on October 2, 2026.

Colleen Hoover Says: “I can narrow [the inspiration for Verity] down to a couple of things. For one, Jeremy’s character was inspired by my husband and how he doesn’t read my books because he has a hard time separating my characters’ thoughts and actions from my own morals. Heath (my husband) is very concrete in his thoughts and I wanted to use that piece of him to inspire a character in this book. But the idea for Verity came to me as my mother and I left the theater earlier this year. We had seen a scary movie and I left disappointed because I hated the ending. I thought the first half of the movie was brilliant, but then when the paranormal aspect was introduced, I was let down. Paranormal things don’t scare me. Real-life situations—things that can actually happen to you—is what scares me. I was complaining to my mother about how I was hoping the movie would end with it being something that could possibly happen to me in real life. When I got home, I started writing an outline. Several hours later, I had completed the outline for Verity.” (anasattic.com)

2. 'Victorian Psycho' (2025)

Victorian PsychoLiveright

Author: Virginia Feito

What it’s about: In 1858, Winifred Notty arrives at an isolated English manor as the family's new governess. Beneath her impeccable manners, however, lurks a deeply disturbed woman whose violent impulses grow increasingly impossible to suppress, forcing readers to question whether she is a victim of her era—or simply a born psychopath.

Adaptation status: The feature stars Maika Monroe, Thomasin McKenzie and Jason Isaacs, with Zachary Wigon directing from a screenplay by Feito herself. The film premiered at Cannes and is awaiting wide release.

Virginia Feito says: “Winifred has experienced an awful, abusive upbringing and lives in a deranged society that represses her every urge. I wanted to ask the reader how anyone could possibly remain sane under these conditions. However, she is a cold-blooded psychopath, and we tend to romanticize those—does her suffering fully explain the violence she commits on innocent people? I wonder if Winifred might behave the same way if she lived in a more understanding, nourishing environment… I wanted to avoid the women-as-victims trope and create a straightforward, unsympathetic female psychopath, but I couldn’t avoid delving into the societal pressures women face and how these could bring anyone to a boiling point that would spill over into violence. Although I do think we’ve made some progress in the female mental health department since the Victorian era, when it was so easy to cart women off to asylums whenever they exhibited any kind of overt feeling, it’s no wonder we still feel vulnerable in a world that seems set up to attack us.” (litromagazine.com)

3. 'Incidents Around the House' (2024)

Incidents Around the HouseDel Rey

Author: Josh Malerman

What it’s about: Eight-year-old Bela believes a friendly figure she calls "Other Mommy" lives in her home. As the entity becomes increasingly possessive and sinister, her family realizes the child's terrifying stories may be far more than imagination.

Adaptation status: Retitled Other Mommy, the film stars Jessica Chastain and is directed by Rob Savage, with James Wan producing through Atomic Monster alongside Blumhouse. It opens October 9, 2026.

Josh Malerman says: “I’ve had the idea for some 13 years. My brother told me a story similar to the first chapter, about him and his wife putting their kid to bed for the night and the kid saying goodnight to ‘Other Mommy.’ The little story stuck in a big way and finally, recently, I wrote the outline on the office wall. Then went for it.” (thenerddaily.com)

4. 'Carrie' (1974)

CarrieVintage

Author: Stephen King

What it’s about: Shy, socially isolated teenager Carrie White has spent her life enduring relentless bullying at school and emotional abuse at home. When she discovers she possesses telekinetic powers just as adolescence pushes her to the breaking point, humiliation turns into one of horror fiction's most unforgettable acts of revenge.

Adaptation status: Mike Flanagan (the brilliant Netflix vampire limited series Midnight Mass) is adapting the novel as an eight-episode Prime Video series starring Summer H. Howell. Unlike previous versions, the series returns directly to King's novel while updating the story for modern audiences.

Why Stephen King’s 'Carrie' Still Haunts Audiences 50 Years Later

Advertisement

Stephen King says: “One day while I was working in the laundry, I started seeing the opening scene of a story: girls showering in a locker room where there were no U-rings, pink plastic curtains or privacy. And this one girl starts to have her period. Only she doesn't know what it is, and the other girls—grossed out, horrified, amused – start pelting her with sanitary napkins … The girl begins to scream. All that blood! I'd read an article in LIFE magazine some years before, suggesting that at least some reported poltergeist activity might actually be telekinetic phenomena—telekinesis being the ability to move objects just by thinking about them. There was some evidence to suggest that young people might have such powers, the article said, especially girls in early adolescence, right around the time of their first period—POW! Two unrelated ideas, adolescent cruelty and telekinesis, came together, and I had an idea …” (theguardian.com)

5. 'Cujo' (1981)

CujoScribner

Author: Stephen King

What it’s about: After a lovable St. Bernard contracts rabies, an ordinary family vacation spirals into a desperate fight for survival when a mother and her young son become trapped inside a disabled car under the relentless assault of the once-gentle dog.

Adaptation status: Netflix is developing a new feature adaptation, with Darren Aronofsky attached to direct. The project remains in development.

Parade.com says: “DespiteCujo's instant popularity among fans of the author’s work, King claims to have little memory of actually writing it, thanks in large part to his worsening drinking habits prior to getting sober. ‘At the end of my adventures I was drinking a case of sixteen-ounce tallboys a night, and there’s one novel, Cujo, that I barely remember writing at all,’ King states in On Writing. ‘I don’t say that with pride or shame, only with a vague sense of sorrow and loss. I like that book. I wish I could remember enjoying the good parts as I put them down on the page.”

6. 'Whalefall' (2023)

WhalefallMTV Books

Author: Daniel Kraus

What it’s about: Haunted by the complicated relationship he shared with his late father, young diver Jay Gardiner searches the ocean floor for his father's remains—only to be swallowed alive by a massive sperm whale. With barely an hour of oxygen remaining, his struggle for survival becomes as much an emotional reckoning as a race against time.

Adaptation status: Brian Duffield directs the 20th Century Studios adaptation, co-writing the screenplay with Daniel Kraus. The cast includes Austin Abrams, Josh Brolin, Elisabeth Shue and Jane Levy. The film is scheduled for release on October 16, 2026.

Daniel Kraus says: “I was drawing from things happening around me at the time. Like, I'm 48 [and] at that age where people I know are starting to die. Just in the last few months, I've had a good friend die, my father-in-law died and my sister is dying right now. That made me think, you know, about ‘Whalefall.’ It made me think about what a good death is. And those sort of ideas collided with the basic high concept idea of being swallowed by a whale and, you know, being swallowed by your parents or the life that you've lived and the regrets that you have.  And being in this moment, whether that's slowly dying in a bed or dying inside the belly of a whale. There comes a time where there's nowhere else to turn and we have to look into ourselves and, you know, determine, have we lived a life worthy of whale fall?”

“The story begins with the diver's father already dead and the idea of a whale fall, which is a giant whale who sinks to the bottom of the deepest part of the ocean, and the corpse lands—what it really does is create centuries' worth of life because of its decomposition. And I thought it was kind of a beautiful metaphor for what the book is about in that there are good deaths and there are bad deaths. And the best death of all, I think, is when you can die and your death means something to others, whether you're passing along something biological, you've got a family, you're leaving behind art or you've just touched people in some way.” (npr.org)

7. 'The Night House' (2023)

The Night HouseVintage

Author: Jo Nesbo

What it’s about: After his parents' deaths, troubled teenager Richard Elauved is sent to live in the remote town of Ballantyne, where mysterious disappearances, eerie abandoned places and unsettling supernatural events blur the line between reality and nightmare.

Adaptation status: A feature film adaptation is in development, bringing Jo Nesbo's chilling supernatural novel to the screen.

Jo Nesbo says: “When I was a kid, the other kids would point at me when we were trying to scare each other with ghost stories. Later they told me it was because they could hear the fear in my voice when I told my stories. They liked the sound effect… I was [also] always fascinated with houses we passed that seemed abandoned or in other ways scary. Some houses have this atmosphere… You can immediately imagine bad things happening there. Searching through abandoned houses gives the same feeling. A broken sofa. A child’s drawing on the wall. Cutlery being left in the drawers. All this is stuff for any kid’s active imagination.” (booktrib.com)

More articles about book adaptations to enjoy

‘The Everlasting’ Series Is Coming to Netflix—and a ‘Maxton Hall’ Writer Is Behind It: What We Know So Far

From ‘Bridgerton’ to ‘Wicked’: 4 Book Adaptations That Rewrote Key Moments

Rebecca Yarros Shares Thrilling Updates on ‘Fourth Wing’ and ‘The Things We Leave Unfinished’ Book Adaptations

Original Article on Source

Source: “AOL Entertainment”