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The Man in the Watch Still Visits Me at Night
Not yet published
Expected 22 Sep 26House of Leaves meets David Lynch in a surreal horror novel exploring generational trauma and the monsters it breeds, from Joshua Chaplinsky, cult author of Letters to the Purple Satin Killer.
The lives of three unlikely women unfold to reveal a shared history of neglect and abuse. At the center looms the Vogel House, a facade of rotten wood and sagging eaves that plays host to a parasitic dream—the malevolent entity known as The Man in the Watch.
After spending the night in an abandoned house, Jenna Thomas returns home haunted by someone else’s past. She revisits the scene in the hopes of exorcising her dreams, only to uncover something far worse. Mrs. Vogel receives an unexpected letter from her estranged daughter. It fills the old woman with hope for the future, even though her daughter is long since dead. Meanwhile, a young woman contends with the legacy of her father while simultaneously fighting for the future of her unborn child.
The Man in the Watch Still Visits Me at Night thrusts readers into a nightmarish dead zone of overlapping realities, presided over by a malignant force that manipulates memory and delights in human suffering.
The lives of three unlikely women unfold to reveal a shared history of neglect and abuse. At the center looms the Vogel House, a facade of rotten wood and sagging eaves that plays host to a parasitic dream—the malevolent entity known as The Man in the Watch.
After spending the night in an abandoned house, Jenna Thomas returns home haunted by someone else’s past. She revisits the scene in the hopes of exorcising her dreams, only to uncover something far worse. Mrs. Vogel receives an unexpected letter from her estranged daughter. It fills the old woman with hope for the future, even though her daughter is long since dead. Meanwhile, a young woman contends with the legacy of her father while simultaneously fighting for the future of her unborn child.
The Man in the Watch Still Visits Me at Night thrusts readers into a nightmarish dead zone of overlapping realities, presided over by a malignant force that manipulates memory and delights in human suffering.
- GenresHorror
308 pages, Paperback
Expected publication September 22, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
May 5, 2026
**E-Arc kindly provided by NetGalley & publisher in exchange for an honest review**
This is a brilliant piece of high-concept horror that delivers exactly what it promises: a blend of the uncanny bizarreness of David Lynch with the twisting unconventional narrative of House of Leaves.
We start out with a fairly straightforward premise: a teen-age girl and her boyfriend breaking into a creepy abandoned house. But the story rapidly twists throughout space and time, jumping between different narratives and slowly cycling into complete and utter weirdness. The novel is rooted in its main character Jenna, a victim of sexual assault by which she falls pregnant, and it’s this theme of assault and a loss of bodily autonomy that pervades each storyline of the novel, from splitting personalities to time loops to an endlessly narrowing, suffocating house. It’s this that anchors the novel and keeps it from drifting off into the territory of incomprehensible & bizarre (which it skirts with several times).
This story lived in the author’s head for 15 years, which must have been exhausting- it’s lived in mine for 4 days and that is more than enough for me. It’s definitely not a light or easy read and requires a solid amount of brain power to comprehend; I think I understood probably about 60% of it. But I had a damn good time! I’m excited to check out some of this author’s other work now.
Bonus: extra stars for the room of Orifices. (Read and find out!)
This is a brilliant piece of high-concept horror that delivers exactly what it promises: a blend of the uncanny bizarreness of David Lynch with the twisting unconventional narrative of House of Leaves.
We start out with a fairly straightforward premise: a teen-age girl and her boyfriend breaking into a creepy abandoned house. But the story rapidly twists throughout space and time, jumping between different narratives and slowly cycling into complete and utter weirdness. The novel is rooted in its main character Jenna, a victim of sexual assault by which she falls pregnant, and it’s this theme of assault and a loss of bodily autonomy that pervades each storyline of the novel, from splitting personalities to time loops to an endlessly narrowing, suffocating house. It’s this that anchors the novel and keeps it from drifting off into the territory of incomprehensible & bizarre (which it skirts with several times).
This story lived in the author’s head for 15 years, which must have been exhausting- it’s lived in mine for 4 days and that is more than enough for me. It’s definitely not a light or easy read and requires a solid amount of brain power to comprehend; I think I understood probably about 60% of it. But I had a damn good time! I’m excited to check out some of this author’s other work now.
Bonus: extra stars for the room of Orifices. (Read and find out!)
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
This one follows you and waits in the dark corners of your room.
The Man in the Watch Still Visits Me at Night is the kind of horror that feels alive. Every strange, impossible moment is rooted in something painfully human.
Generational trauma bleeds through every page, warping these women’s lives into something tragic and haunting.
The Vogel House itself feels less like a setting and more like a living organism. Rotting, breathing, hungry. Every time the story returned there, I felt this creeping sense of dread that only intensified as the narratives slowly folded into one another.
And then there’s The Man in the Watch… a presence that lingers over the novel like a bad dream you can’t fully wake from.
What I loved most was how fearless this book is. It refuses to hold your hand. The narrative fractures and spirals, memories blur into nightmares, timelines overlap. Beneath all the surrealism and cosmic unease is a devastating story about inherited pain, violation, motherhood, identity, and the ways trauma reshapes generations.
There were moments when I genuinely felt disoriented in the best possible way, as if the book itself was manipulating my perception. It captures that same impossible atmosphere as a nightmare where every door leads somewhere wrong, but you keep opening them anyway. It’s oppressive, disorienting, emotionally raw, and unapologetically weird.
Thank you so much CLASH Books, Joshua Chaplinsky, & NetGalley for the #gifted earc.
All opinions are my own 🖤
The Man in the Watch Still Visits Me at Night is the kind of horror that feels alive. Every strange, impossible moment is rooted in something painfully human.
Generational trauma bleeds through every page, warping these women’s lives into something tragic and haunting.
The Vogel House itself feels less like a setting and more like a living organism. Rotting, breathing, hungry. Every time the story returned there, I felt this creeping sense of dread that only intensified as the narratives slowly folded into one another.
And then there’s The Man in the Watch… a presence that lingers over the novel like a bad dream you can’t fully wake from.
What I loved most was how fearless this book is. It refuses to hold your hand. The narrative fractures and spirals, memories blur into nightmares, timelines overlap. Beneath all the surrealism and cosmic unease is a devastating story about inherited pain, violation, motherhood, identity, and the ways trauma reshapes generations.
There were moments when I genuinely felt disoriented in the best possible way, as if the book itself was manipulating my perception. It captures that same impossible atmosphere as a nightmare where every door leads somewhere wrong, but you keep opening them anyway. It’s oppressive, disorienting, emotionally raw, and unapologetically weird.
Thank you so much CLASH Books, Joshua Chaplinsky, & NetGalley for the #gifted earc.
All opinions are my own 🖤
May 7, 2026
Honestly, I can’t even begin to write this review. It’s feels like no matter the words I choose to put down, a disservice will be made to the novel. It is weird, it is frantic. It is held together by loose strings for a while, then those strings slowly cinch tighter around the reader’s neck, forcing audible gasps for air, quietly drowning them in the created atmosphere, and then reanimating the reader in a conclusion unlike any I’ve ever read.
Being a fan of Danielewski’s epochal debut novel and Lynch’s esoteric films, this was a fresh breath of horror in an occasionally stale landscape of tropes. This felt new. This felt raw. In an age where it seems every idea is recycled, repurposed and regurgitated, like a mother pigeon allofeeding her young, this felt like the pinnacle that subsequent ideas will trickle down from.
If you can’t tell, I liked it. No, I loved it. I read Letters to the Purple Satin Killer last year and loved that too. I’m sensing a trend.
I don’t want to say much about the plot for fear of revealing some things that take time to realize while reading. I’d rather you pick this one up on your own, read it. Devour it. Be consumed by it. If you allow this novel to do what it sets out to do, you too will wish that you could spend another night in the Vogel House.
Thank you Joshua Chaplinsky for the opportunity to ARC read this one. Hits shelves on 9/22/26. I will be preordering my copy.
Being a fan of Danielewski’s epochal debut novel and Lynch’s esoteric films, this was a fresh breath of horror in an occasionally stale landscape of tropes. This felt new. This felt raw. In an age where it seems every idea is recycled, repurposed and regurgitated, like a mother pigeon allofeeding her young, this felt like the pinnacle that subsequent ideas will trickle down from.
If you can’t tell, I liked it. No, I loved it. I read Letters to the Purple Satin Killer last year and loved that too. I’m sensing a trend.
I don’t want to say much about the plot for fear of revealing some things that take time to realize while reading. I’d rather you pick this one up on your own, read it. Devour it. Be consumed by it. If you allow this novel to do what it sets out to do, you too will wish that you could spend another night in the Vogel House.
Thank you Joshua Chaplinsky for the opportunity to ARC read this one. Hits shelves on 9/22/26. I will be preordering my copy.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews