Yoe - Swamp Monsters!

Let me be clear -- I have no interest in spending even a split second in an actual real world swamp. Swamps have many if not most of the things which make the out-of-doors a speculative proposition for me. Swamps are wet, moist, and damp which makes for a cloying uncomfortable atmosphere. They offer little or no secure footing, making traversing them difficult and time consuming. While decomposition of living matter is the necessary fuel for the natural world and I celebrate that good and proper cyclical process from a distance, being in and amongst all that rot and fetid decay is exceedingly low on my list of things to do on any given day. And then there are the zombies, the ghouls, the witches, the hags, the crones, the muck monsters, and even the occasional alligator-woman (or two) to contend with. If you want to try and tell me most of those aren't really real, I will simply refer you to Swamp Monsters from Yoe Books and IDW Publishing. 

This is a fun collection of vintage pre-code public domain comic book yarns from many of the long gone but not forgotten publishers who jumped into the fray before professional scolds made everyone lay off. There some dandy artists here led by Basil Wolverton and Ken Landau. You will not find the more famous muck monsters such as DC's Swamp Thing, Marvel's Man-Thing, nor even Hillman's The Heap as those are too early or too late or too well legally protected to gain entry into this tome. These are the "other goons" the critters that go bump in the muck. Glorious oddities, not the least of which is the tadpole with a wristwatch. (Bet that was a sentence you didn't expect to read today.) 

The collection is fronted by an excellent and a typically well-researched essay by Stephen Bissette, a comic book artist of no small regard and utter monster maven. In his essay you just might find some of those famous monsters I mentioned above, as well as a new on on me from a story titled "Return of the Swamp Beast" which you can read here. I bought this one for the vintage yarns, but I stayed for the essay, it's a good one and filled with info. This one is highly recommended. 

Rip Off