In October, Eisner and multi-award-winning creator J.H. Williams III will release Dracula: A Storybook Portfolio, a new horror nightmare. This hardcover book features over 150 pages of painted illustrations and story passages, retelling the classic Dracula tale. The unique storybook format, similar to an illustrated children’s book, combines paintings with story pages, creating a stunning gothic world. The release is perfectly timed for the Halloween season. With this project, Williams III aims to delve further into the Dracula myth, offering a fantastical and absorbing storytelling experience that surpasses the typical expectations of an art book.
“Since I talk about what inspired this project in the foreword inside the book, I’ll just say that I’m excited to have it come out,” said Williams III. “I don’t think I’ve seen a book quite like this in the modern era. I sought to make it a different kind of thing than what some would expect, an attempt to marry portfolio illustrations with brief passages to create a narrative structure that most art books don’t tend to focus on. Because of it having a single narrative subject, the illustration choices are reflective of that. I gave the prose sections a subtle older style, but delivered with a somewhat brisk sensibility. All with a desire to have it call back to classic storybooks that often became annual favorites of the young and old. Every aspect of the book, with the assistance of Image Comics’ Drew Gill, is geared toward that simple but pleasant idea. The result is unique and hopefully satisfying.”
Dracula: A Storybook Portfolio with a cover by Williams III (ISBN: 9781534371569, Lunar Code 0624IM266) will be released at local comic book shops on Wednesday, October 9. It will also be available on various digital platforms such as Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, and Google Play.
