Abigail Moyer loves a gothic mystery. The author’s debut thriller, One of My Patients is a Vampire, concerns a jaded psychiatrist who finds a body drained of blood on his office doorstep. We talked to Moyer about how her childhood in Heshey, Pa., has inspired her work, her love of chocolate and Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and why she’s often compared to a Tim Burton character.

You were raised near Hershey, Pa., the book's setting. Why did you want to set the story there?

Hershey is a very strange place. The lampposts are shaped like Hershey's Kisses, and the park gives free rides on singing carts past animatronic mooing cows wearing pink boas. The place is screaming, begging, to be a character. It's part dreamy Americana, part company town, part middle-of-nowhere. I spent so much time riding rollercoasters that the roaring sound of the tracks is almost the same as the baseline silence in my head. It's calming to me, in a way. There are the beautiful Hershey Gardens, a zoo called ZooAmerica, and then, of course, Hersheypark. The place is one of the most significant characters in the novel—beautiful and strange, but with a bit of whimsy.

Ian was supposed to die after a chemical accident at his lab when he was thirty—he's now just over sixty. And he hasn't really decided to start living. We meet him when he's most jaded about everything: psychiatry, his health, his friends. Then Alexandra Abrams shows up, and she's the first person to wake him up in decades. But then he finds out she is an infamous accused murderer.

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Want to get a sneak peek at the book critics are praising? Check out the first 35 pages of One of My Patients Is a Vampire, before the title hits shelves in October.

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Kirkus praises One of My Patients Is a Vampire as “a uniquely dark and decadent confection” and applauds the novel’s ability to blend “gonzo oddities” with an “unironically sexy, tragic, and romantic plot.” The review highlights Moyer’s fresh, fearless approach to gothic suspense, romance, and supernatural mystery.

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Be among the 20 lucky winners of an advanced reader copy of One of My Patients Is a Vampire and find out exactly which patient is a vampire ahead of the October 26 release date, right in time for Halloween!

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Abigail Moyer is the author of One of My Patients Is a Vampire, forthcoming in October 2026. She was raised near Hershey, Pa., the setting for the novel, where she developed an enduring love of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups—and, more controversially, Hershey’s milk chocolate. She still eats an obscene amount of candy and has trained her taste buds to appreciate the distinctive, chemical flavor of Hershey’s chocolate.

Moyer studied Dramatic Writing at New York University and lived in New York while earning her degree. She now lives in Los Angeles, where she writes books and continues to indulge her sweet tooth.

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