Joe Hill | Signed First Editions

About Joe Hill

Joe Hill was born Joseph Hillström King on 4 June 1972 in Bangor, Maine, the son of Stephen and Tabitha King. He studied at Vassar College and made a conscious decision early on that he wanted to find his own way as a writer. Rather than trade on the King name, he published under the shortened name Joe Hill and kept his parentage out of the public eye for roughly a decade. By the time he confirmed his identity publicly in 2007, however, there was already little doubt that he had a substantial career of his own ahead of him.

His first novel, Heart-Shaped Box, appeared that same year and won the Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel. Hill also won the Stoker for Best Fiction Collection in 2007 for 20th Century Ghosts, making it an unusually impressive first year. Horns followed in 2010 and was adapted for the screen in 2014, with Daniel Radcliffe in the lead role. Then came NOS4A2 (2013), a much larger and stranger novel that was subsequently made into a two-season AMC television series. The Fireman (2016) reached number one on the New York Times bestseller list and won the Goodreads Choice Award for Best Horror Novel. His latest novel, King Sorrow, appeared in 2025.

Hill’s career has never been confined to novels. His comic-book series Locke & Key, created with artist Gabriel Rodriguez, earned him an Eisner Award for Best Writer and eventually became a three-season Netflix series. His short story ‘The Black Phone’ was adapted into the successful Blumhouse film of the same name, which was followed by a sequel in 2025. He has also written further comics for DC, including Basketful of Heads and Plunge. Few writers working in contemporary horror have managed to move so comfortably between novels, comics, film and television.

The awards have followed him across those different forms. Alongside his Bram Stokers, Hill has received British Fantasy Awards and was awarded the Ray Bradbury Fellowship early in his career. The obvious comparison with his father was unavoidable, particularly at the beginning, but Hill’s work has increasingly stood on its own terms. His horror can be colder and more structurally elaborate than Stephen King’s, and he returns frequently to questions of family, inheritance and the things that pass from one generation to another – themes that inevitably acquire another layer when the author’s own family history is taken into account.

Now in his fifties, Hill continues to divide his work between novels, comics and screen projects, with his life divided between New England and England. King Sorrow has given his fiction another burst of attention, while further Locke & Key material remains in development. His reputation is now firmly established, and the interesting thing is no longer whether Joe Hill can escape his father’s shadow. He did that some time ago. The more useful question is what he will do with the considerable space he has made for himself.