A father returns from serving in Vietnam with a strange and terrifying addiction; a man removes something horrifying from his fireplace, and becomes desperate to return it; and a right-wing news channel has its hooks in people in more ways than one. From department store Santas to ghost boyfriends and salamander-worshipping nuns; from the claustrophobia of the Covid-19 pandemic to small-town Chesapeake USA, Clay McLeod Chapman takes universal fears of parenthood, addiction and political divisions and makes them uniquely his own. Packed full of humanity, humour and above all, relentless creeping dread, Acquired Taste is a timely descent into the mind of one of modern horror's finest authors.