Scott Nicolay, after
Wednesday, May 15, 2024
CREEPER
Tuesday, April 9, 2024
NEW BOOK PREORDERS!
I know it's been a while since I posted but it's been a wild time. For the last year or so I've been quietly working on a book. Well I can now reveal what it is and even the cover! I've been working on an illustrated edition of H.P. Lovecraft's Commonplace Book! There are 30 full page illustrations and 11 spot illustrations and I even designed the whole thing!
This also worked out because there was a lot of Lovecraft influence in the early days of D&D. My cover was inspired by supplemental material from that time period, specifically work by Erol Otus.
Now, I've actually illustrated a bunch of creatures mentioned in the Commonplace Book on this blog. But for this project I tried to approach everything with fresh eyes. So in most cases I've completely redesigned things that I'd drawn previously and in some cases I kept the original design but redrew them.
This has been the last year of my artistic life and it's something I'm incredibly proud of. I hope you all grab a copy and enjoy it as much as I enjoyed making it!
Speaking of things I'm proud of, you can still get copies of Monstrous Mythologies at Lethe Press!
Monday, July 31, 2023
SCAB
When a scab comes down the street, men turn their backs and angels weep in heaven, and the devil shuts the gates of hell to keep him out. No man has a right to scab as long as there is a pool of water deep enough to drown his body in, or a rope long enough to hang his carcass with. Judas Iscariot was a gentleman compared with a scab. For betraying his Master, he had character enough to hang himself. A scab hasn't.
Esau sold his birthright for a mess of pottage. Judas Iscariot sold his savior for thirty pieces of silver. Benedict Arnold sold his country for a promise of a commission in the British Army. The modern strikebreaker sells his birthright, his country, his wife, his children, and his fellow men for an unfulfilled promise from his employer, trust, or corporation
Solidarity wins"
Jack London, Ode To A Scab
Friday, June 30, 2023
SUCCUBA
H.P. Lovecraft, The Horror At Red Hook
"Succubus.
A devil in female form, the succubus specializes in seducing men.
Although feminine in meaning, in form this medieval Latin word, succubus, is masculine (because demons were supposedly sexless); the feminine form succuba (strumpet) is occasionally found."
Rossell Hope Robbins, Encyclopedia Of Witchcraft & Demonology
Monday, June 26, 2023
INSECTOID BEAST
"He could see, miles below the surface, a large stone slab, rough and stained. The bodies of children were splattering against it, and crouched down in that darkness was a creature, a large black beast with stiff limbs, each long and bent but quick. The creature's elongated, twitching head danced atop its insectiod torso as it skittered from one end of the slab to the other, gathering the broken bodies of the children as fast as they were falling, enwrapping them, keeping them alive, keeping them for its own sake."
Philip Fracassi, Altar
Friday, June 16, 2023
INCUBUS
Thursday, June 15, 2023
INTERDIMENSIONAL SPIRIT
"It was incredible, surely, but there, opposite and slightly above me, were shapes of some indeterminate sort among the willows, and as the branches swayed in the wind they seemed to group themselves about these shapes, forming a series of monstrous outlines that shifted rapidly beneath the moon. Close, about fifty feet in front of me, I saw these things."