WEB OF MYSTERY Volume 1

Here comes the first volume of Ace Comics' horror title, one that I personally like quite a bit. Artist Lou Cameron is here and Mike Sekowsky, strongly influenced by Alex Toth, my favorite period for him. Stories include "The Vampire's Weird Duel," "Valley of the Mayan Goddess," "The Menace That Stalked Brooding Cunliffe," "Rendevous with the Phantom Gypsies," and "Stalked by a Nameless Dread." Artist Jack Katz puts in an appearance in "Vengeance of the Undead," and there's a great femme fatale tale, "The Lorelei of Loon Lake," "Ghost Ship of the Caribbean," and "The Case of the Beckoning Mummy." Artist Lou Cameron is an unsung name from this time; his Time Machine for Classics Illustrated is his best known work, but early on, 1950-56, he was doing superior and imaginative artwork sometimes as good as Frazetta or Williamson for Ace's horror titles, this one and also The Beyond. And here's Mike Sekowsky, between his career beginning at Timely in the late 1940s, and ending up at DC Comics for decades, drawing dozens of their best-known heroes. He was the first artist on the Justice League. From the publisher: "Come put your little clawed and emaciated hand in ours -- we'll look after you. Ignore the darkness and the cemetery mist creeping through the Graveyard Gates, and ignore the fact that the flesh seems to have slipped from your face. No matter, for this is comic books the way they were and should always be." The hardcover edition of this came out in 2018, went on sale through us in 2020-21 and is no longer in stock.