Caroline Kepnes is turning one of her short stories into a television series, Variety reports.
The author will write and direct The Attentionist, based on her story of the same name, which was published in the anthology Dark Stars: New Tales of Darkest Horror, which Tor Nightfire released in 2023. The story follows Maeve, a teenage girl who embarks on a phone-based romance that turns dark.
Kepnes made her fiction debut in 2014 with the thriller You, the first in a series that continued with Hidden Bodies, You Love Me, For You and Only You, and You First. The series was adapted into a television show starring Penn Badgley that aired on Lifetime in 2018 and on Netflix from 2019 to 2025.
The first season of The Attentionist will span eight episodes and air on YouTube. It will be filmed on Cape Cod, Massachusetts, where the series is set.
“Sometimes it feels like a lakeside slasher, and sometimes it feels like a boy-meets-girl oceanside summer romance,” Kepnes said. “I wrote ‘The Attentionist’ as a mashup of genres and being at the helm of the adaptation is quite literally a dream come true. I wanted to combine my love of emotional creepy horror with my affection for small town family drama, and set it in the veiled, insular world of the Cape where I grew up.”
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
