Book: October Film Haunt
Author: Michael Wehunt
Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
Publication Date: September 30, 2025
Capone’s Rating: 5 of 5 ⭐s

This book is ambitious, first and foremost, and it works.

Jorie Stroud was a member of the October Film Haunt team, a three-person investigative crew who made their podcast living checking out the shooting locations and real-life settings of horror films. When we pick up the story, years have passed, and Jorie has been in hiding. Why hide? Well, things went bad when the trio followed Proof of Demons to its origin and reported from the scene of the Pine Arch Monster. Something went wrong during that haunt. Jorie and Co. were pilloried online, threatened, and forced underground. Since then, Jorie has put the horror life behind her. The novel’s inciting incident is the arrival on her doorstep of a videotape. Proof of Demons… is it getting a sequel? Fanatics who were so threatening toward her in the past are back, and they’re outside her Vermont hideaway. Jorie doesn’t want to be a part of the new horror film, but she might not have a choice. Things escalate quite a bit from there, and I was drawn into the fray.

The elements that work about this story are easy to spot. Breadcrumbs are laid masterfully. Characters about whom we care are put in actual danger. Blood and guts do erupt, but to great effect—at no point do we get the sense they’re sacrificed for plot purposes alone. The convolutions are surprising without being absurd. The tone is just serious enough.

The theme, according at least to this reader, is worth your time, too: Wanting to belong is dangerous, and the need to belong affects the most vulnerable among us.

And the book is scary. I don’t often say this. I read some 80-100 horror books per year, and the last one that really left me feeling spooked to any extent was Malerman’s Incidents Around the House. This book hit the same notes of discomfort for me. (I don’t diss books that don’t scare me; in fact, those of you who read my reviews might already know I don’t actually like to be scared—but truly, if a horror writer is able to scare me, it’s impressive, given the sheer amount of horror content I consume on a daily, weekly, yearly basis.)

For fans of the meta-horror and close-third perspective of Stephen Graham Jones’ Indian Lake Trilogy, this book feels like a bit of that vibe mixed with a bit of Paul Tremblay’s Horror Movie and Grady Hendrix’s Final Girl Support Group. This book ticks all the boxes for this reader.

I'll be using bits of this for my Horror Literature class, for sure.

Five stars. Would recommend.

***Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the ARC of this upcoming book***
A very interesting premise for a horror novel that is well written and has loads of genuinely creepy moments. I was a little confused by the ending and what exactly was going on but overall I enjoyed this one and would recommend it to any horror fans looking to be creeped out. Give it a read!

Color me haunted. And while we've got the crayons out, color me impressed. The October Film Haunt is the most creepy, freaky, scary book I've read in a long, long while, and that is a thing of both beauty and immense pleasure, for books are magic, and the magic in this one is electric.


The October Film Haunt is "the breach in the wall between what is real and what is made up."


So step on up horror fans. The haunt is waiting. Are you ready to see into hell? Do you belong?

Jorie Stroud, a rising star in the popular online group called the October Film Haunt, joined her partners Beth and Colin in visiting some popular film haunts. Things were going well for them and their careers were taking off due to their popularity among horror enthusiasts. But that all changed when they visited the graveyard location where the cult classic film “Proof of Demons” was filmed. Years later, Jorie lives a reclusive life with her son Oli, putting her past behind her until a mysterious VHS tape arrives in the mail with connection to that fateful night. Jorie knows that she must confront the past to save her family.

This review is a little harder for me, because there’s a lot that I enjoyed, but plenty that, unfortunately, didn’t work for me. First of all, I enjoyed the creepy, unsettling atmosphere that Wehunt created. Mixing in the found footage, notes, and Wikipedia excerpts to the story was a very creative and interesting addition, which made this story stand out a bit more to me. However, the book moves far too slowly and there were plenty of times where I found my attention waning. Some of that could have been due to a few of the POVs that I just didn’t find that captivating.

The October Film Haunt is an entertaining, experimental horror story. If you like found footage horror stories, or those that deal with occult themes you’ll enjoy this one. Overall, this one sadly didn’t quite work for me. It certainly wasn’t a bad read, but not a memorable one either.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press, Michael Wehunt, and Netgalley for the advanced review copy.

The October Film Haunt is easily one of my favorite books of the year. Hell, it's an all-time favorite. This book hooked its claws in me and absolutely would not let go. When I wasn't reading it, I was thinking about it. It combined all of my favorite elements—founs footage, analog horror, cults, copypasta, cultural demons, folk horror. It has some scenes that felt a little kids-on-bikes, but in a Hocus Pocus, autumnal way.
The prose is engaging, the characters feel real. Sometimes they make some dumb decisions, but it's believable. Some parts absolutely tore my heart out, and I was wavering between crying and being absolutely freaked out.
While the ending was a let down, to put it lightly, I loved the rest of the book so much that it didn't change how I feel about it.
This book is will be a modern classic. I'm certain of it.

Excellent premise, though it didn't fully pull me in. The pacing seemed a bit slow and info the characters felt flat for me. Not a bad book by any means, just hard to get into it.

“Will you believe in what you made?”

This is certainly unlike any book I’ve read. It draws you in with a “haunted media” revenge premise and then expands that beyond what you think a conventional narrative might look like. This is a metafictional work that considers not only horror as a medium, but the fanfare and influence that surrounds it.

To put a point on it, I would liken this novel to maybe String Follow by Simon Jacobs and Negative Space by B.R. Yeager. I truly enjoyed the majority of this book, and think that the discourse surrounding it once it launches will be interesting.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing this ARC.

This book started very slowly, but I had hopes that it would pick up and be a great read. Unfortunately it never really got there.

I really appreciated how much the book felt like a love letter to horror and horror fans, but that was unfortunately the only great thing about this book for me.

I felt bored during most of this book and a lot of it was just a bit too experimental for me. It felt a bit more like reading a creepy pasta than reading a real published book.

This gave me major found footage vibes I liked the alt chapters or that's what kindle called it they were like epistolary chapters and I do love a book with epistolary elements. Gave me a little blair witch meets the book horror movie by Paul tremblay.

I am a sucker for found footage/cursed media, and keep looking for the thrill and creep factor movies like The Ring gave me. And that's usually where the genre fails in book form, because seeing is usually more impactful than describing when it comes to cursed media, I guess? But I loved the sound of the premise of The October Film Haunt... a cult film with tragic ties coming back to "haunt"(pun intended!) a horror movie enthusiast. Sadly, I could not get in to the story past the plot description. Like others have said, it moves very slooooow. And it was a little hard to follow what was going on, or feel invested in anything. So sadly this title was not for me.

Clay McLeod Chapman expertly crafts a haunting narrative that blurs the line between fiction and reality. The novel thrives on its slow build, creating a pervasive sense of unease that lingers long after you’ve turned the final page. The interplay between horror fandom, personal trauma, and the dangers of chasing lost legends is handled with both nuance and dread. Chapman’s characters, especially Jorie, feel painfully real—flawed, vulnerable, and haunted in more ways than one.

While the middle portion of the book occasionally drags, the tension ultimately pays off. The horror is both cerebral and supernatural, evoking the fear of being trapped in someone else’s narrative—a film you can’t walk out of. Thank you for the ARC!

Unfortunately this was not it for me. The concept and idea is so great but the writing was so clunky it was hard to immerse yourself and sometimes even understand what was going on. This took me a while to get through.

This is my first Wehunt, and it's a pretty damn solid horror novel. I will admit the character named after a major horror social media personality did draw me out of the happenings at times. However, the premise is overall solid and the way things build is incredibly well done. This maybe could've had a bit cut out of it, but the experience was a really fun ride. He also did a really good job using horror fandom as the way the haunting spreads. I think a lot of folks will like this.

I've been in awe of Michael's writing for a long, long time. "October Film Haunt: Under The House" was masterful (even though I am still mad that the dog dies, I swear I'll never forgive you, Michael), so when I found out that was the basis for the novel, I was STOKED. So beyond excited. I have been watching for news of the release since I heard of its eventual existence. Michael was kind enough to send it to me on NetGalley, because I literally could not wait to read this.

Now, I could probably extol Michael's writing talent for days. I have in my past reviews. His writing is crisp yet haunting, efficient yet lingering. Anything he writes is a master class in not just prose, but the emotion behind it. There were so many lines that knocked me off my feet. I'd recite some, but I wasn't able to highlight anything in my digital copy. Just trust me. It's immaculate.

The one thing that really shines in this book is the love for the horror genre--analog horror in specific. The references to the final girl and horror movie film structure is enough to make any horror fan cheer. Getting analog horror to work in a text based format defines Michael's mastery. When the general public thinks about analog horror, they may picture The Mandela Catalog, The Smile Tapes, Q, Gemini Home Entertainment, etc. Mark my words, people will be adding Michael Wehunt to that list. Analog horror elicits a feeling of eeriness and discomfort that few other mediums can elicit. The fact that Michael can capture that uncanny feeling without any actual images is quite honestly awe inspiring. Not only does he perfect this in literary format, but he is able to carry that feeling through a whole book. It's just perfection.

Thank you, Michael, for giving me a chance to read this early. You're the best. I hungrily await more of your writing. It can't come fast enough.

Give Frida kisses from me.

Really wanted to love this book but couldn't get into it. The narration and writing is very confusing and keeps jumping between different POV and timelines.

I was so grateful to be chosen to receive an ARC for this novel. Wehunt did a great job crafting a story that keeps readers intrigued. While there were parts that I felt might have been lacking, there were other parts that did make up for that. All in all, I thought it was a decent read!

Really great. About halfway through I felt like I was reading something brilliant. Wehunt is a very talented writer, and the details of the story seemed very of the current moment (as well as some recent moments in the backstory). I was here and there on the ending but, five stars for the quality of writing and the ambition and insights on display here.

About a third of the way through The October Film Haunt, I began to write a rather petulant review**. For the sake of posterity, it’s included at the bottom of this complete review. Feel free to have a look and then pop back up to here to read me eat crow because, as it turns out, I was entirely wrong. The introduction of new characters had huge emotional payoff, as did the occasionally tangential journeys into their lives. Not to spoil things, but this is a horror novel, and an exquisite one, so the stakes are life and death. As the death toll rose, I was biting my nails down to the quick and (more than once) weeping.

It is not a surprise to me that Michael Wehunt has mainly written short fiction before creating this dense, lyrical, and supremely satisfying full-length project. There are tableaus throughout The October Film Haunt that could be, in another world, short stories of aching human things like grief and isolation and regret. While the attention paid to the human condition in The October Film Haunt can, at times, feel tangential, everything comes viciously full circle at the end in a way that will have you connecting the dots retrospectively like the final survivor in a Saw movie while "Hello Zepp" thrums in the background.

I highly recommend The October Film Haunt for fans of the following novels: Experimental Film by Gemma Files, Last Days by Adam Nevill, We Eat Our Own by Kea Wilson, Mister Magic by Kiersten White, and Episode Thirteen by Craig DiLouie

I also highly recommend The October Film Haunt for fans of the following horror movies: The Ring (2002), The V/H/S Franchise, Resolution (2012), The Endless (2017), and Unfriended (2014).

Endless thanks to the St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for the chance to get swept away in this deliciously frightful novel.

**The bones of The October Film Haunt are absolutely perfect for horror fans; timely, genre-aware without being too meta or self-referential: a maybe-real horror film that’s achieved (literal) cult status, a protagonist haunted by her past who knows all the mistakes characters in horror movies make and how to avoid them, and a requel/reboot that could have devastating consequences. I was enraptured and even a little spooked for the first nine chapters or so, after which point The October Film Haunt lost me a bit by breaking up the central plot with the introduction of new characters. This in itself isn’t a bad thing, but the weight of the same slightly overwrought language with each new perspective got wearying after a while. I never thought I’d complain about a horror novel being too literary, but the language, while lovely, does begin to distract from the plot, slowing the action down to a crawl just when I began to feel invested.

The ending is a masterful blend of intensity, emotion, and unease, culminating in a sense of inescapable doom that binds the horrors of the past and present. A flawed yet unforgettable horror novel that offers patient readers a richly terrifying experience.

*Huge thank you to Netgalley, St. Martin’s Press and Michael Wehunt for the digital ARC of this!*

Like many readers, my first foray into Michael’s work was through his phenomenal debut collection, ‘Greener Pastures.’ And, like many readers, one of the stories in that collection that stood out most to me was ‘October Film Haunt: Under the House.’ Told through multiple POV’s and using a found-footage narrative, it was unsettling like few stories before.

Fast forward almost a decade from when ‘Greener Pastures’ was released and Wehunt is delivering his debut novel, ‘The October Film Haunt,’ which excitedly jumps from where that story led us and carries us is a wildly imaginative and creepy journey.

I was beyond excited when this was announced, as Michael’s work is stunning, but while reading it, I came to realize this was written on another level all-together. Even for Michael. I say that, because in my long life of reading, very few books have ever invaded my dreams. Sure, I’ve had a lot of crazy dreams – and if I’m being honest, 99% of all of my dreams are apocalyptic, so there’s that to discuss with someone one day – but typically, whatever it is I’m reading, I don’t dream about. But this novel was different.

The last time I had such vivid, waking dreams that invaded my brain and held me so tightly was during the four-year period when I was researching (and joined) a cult on the dark web. I saw things there that deeply disturbed me, changed my beliefs about everything out there and settled into my psyche and decayed. And I haven’t felt that since leaving that group behind.

Until I read this book.

What I liked: The story follows Jorie Stroud. She’s fled her abusive husband with her son to remote Vermont to start again, while still on a self-imposed exile from her past life as a film blogger. Her, along with her friends Beth and Colin, used to have a blog where they dissected horror films, but also went to various locations where they took place to discuss them in greater detail. After an incident where Jorie fictionalized one such stay, birthing an urban legend life to an unknown film’s demon, a teenage girl died, and she holds herself accountable.

Things are moving along in her life now, though. She’s got some editing clients. Has a decent job at a local grocery store and she’d doing the best that she can for her and her son.

Until odd things begin. Teaser trailers for a supposed sequel to ‘Proof of Demons,’ the movie that Jorie, Beth and Colin brought to a larger group, pop up online. And though Colin died years prior, Jorie feels the need to contact Beth and try and reconnect, to see if anything’s happening to her.

Wehunt sets the stage marvelously. We get some extra players – Coleman, an older man with terminal cancer who suddenly realizes what happened to his brother when they were kids is related to this new movie. We get Jorie’s neighbor, Mrs. Compton, who is there to help take care of her son, but wavers between standoffish and ecstatic. And we get Trevor Henderson, creator of Siren Head, who created the original Pine Arch Creature in Proof of Demons, who starts to see the same people in green sheets with cameras, just like the rest of them.

As each chapter unravels and more pieces to the puzzle are revealed, Wehunt does a magnificent job of elevation your heart rate. You suddenly wonder if things within the book are actually going viral online, in the real world. It has to do with the meta elements, but also a harkening back to the old days when we all watched The Blair Witch Project and wondered if it was just a movie… or a documentary.

I want to go on and on about more elements, but I fear those will fall into spoiler territory, but I have to mention that the elements carried forward from Under the House, but also the supernatural creep that happens, was fantastic and perhaps the most powerful element within.

The last few chapters were perfect and the ending – though jarring – was quite possibly the best non-jump scare, jump scare I’ve ever read.

What I didn’t like: Often times, books with multiple POV’s that are switched from chapter to chapter seem to slow any momentum, and I found that to be the case for the first quarter. It felt like every time we were were on the cusp of some new details, the chapter ended and the next one started out with no tension or revving of an engine. Once things get established, that faded, but in the beginning I definitely noticed it.

As well, I personally wasn’t a fan of the Trevor Henderson meta character. Because I interact with him, DM occasionally and he’s been super kind to my son, his introduction took me far out of the ‘fiction’ aspect of the book. It’s the same thing when you’re reading a fantasy book or a horror book and a character pops up named in ode to one of your author friends and it kind of breaks the fourth wall. Saying that, the Trevor angle was fantastic and I just told myself to get over it, ha!

Why you should buy this: This isn’t an easy read. No, it’s a heavy, weighted, cloud-covered story that sucks the air from the room and drops the temperature with ease. But such is the case with all Wehunt stories, no matter the length.

‘The October Film Haunt: A Novel’ does what few books ever do to me. It made me anxious and untrusting of random people on the street. It made me question whether this was ‘just a book,’ or was it part of a larger, meta, viral angle that has us all being played by Michael, who is sitting back with a grin on his face while moving the marionette strings.

Much like ‘The Blair Witch Project’ moved a generation of us moviegoers at the ends of the 90s, ‘The October Film Haunt’ is poised to usher in a similar movement for readers here in the mid 2020’s. I worry we may not be ready for it. But we should be.

The Pine Arch Creature is about to arrive.

The shadows are already moving.