The Making of The Call of Cthulhu: A Mystery in Three Parts by H. P. Lovecraft and illustrated by Gary Gianni.

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“Originally, I planned to illustrate The Call of The Wild because ‘The Wild’ is easier to pronounce than ‘Cthulhu.’

“However, once I learned the language of the Ancient Ones, there was little difficulty. You too, will find yourself absorbed as this cosmic mystery whisks you over the seven continents and under the seven seas. Be forewarned. I can only pray sensitive readers will not be driven mad when the shocking secrets are revealed in this masterpiece of Horror Literature.

“If you've read The Call of Cthulhu before, and you haven't been driven mad, you need to read it again.”  

— Gary Gianni, illustrator

The Making of The Call of Cthulhu: A Mystery in Three Parts by H. P. Lovecraft and illustrated by Gary Gianni.

Written by Flesk publisher, John Fleskes

Back in 2018 we released The Illustrated Call of Cthulhu by H. P. Lovecraft with pictures by Gary Gianni. This hardcover had a limited print run that was offered to our Hellboy Into the Silent Sea Studio Edition Kickstarter supporters as a free bonus item.

The origin of this illustrated Lovecraft book began around 2010. Gary Gianni was working on a personal project; a fully illustrated edition of one of Lovecraft’s most highly regarded texts, The Call of Cthulhu. His good friend, the seminal editor and designer Marcelo Anciano worked together with Gianni to shape the project.

“Gary and I started The Illustrated Call of Cthuhlu over ten years ago now,” shares Marcelo. “It began almost as an experiment in storytelling. Initially we were looking to have the book filled with Gary’s ink line work and he even did a painting of one of the pages. As we developed the sketches to find the voice of the story, I loved the spontaneous quality of the pencil line work and we wanted to keep that quality.”

In early September 2017 while we were running our Hellboy: Into the Silent Sea Kickstarter campaign, Gary showed me his sketchbook of Call of Cthulhu illustrations. He and Marcelo had put a lot of thought and energy into a lavishly produced edition of H. P. Lovecraft’s horror story. They completed a full mock-up of the book by heavily designing the story with approximately 100 pencil drawings. The drawings were to be finished in pen and ink. Despite their intentions to complete the book, and in spite of all the pencil work, it was set aside and never came to fruition.

“The sketchbook was largely forgotten until Gary suggested we could publish it as a bonus item alongside the Kickstarter campaign for Gary and Mike Mignola’s Hellboy art book,” reminisces Marcelo. “So, we put the sketch book together as we felt that it was probably going to be the only time we would see the book published. We found that most mainstream publishers didn’t know whether it was an illustrated Lovecraft book or a graphic novel without word balloons.”

Not only did we unlock the Kickstarter stretch goal to publish this book, we decided to upgrade it from a paperback to a hardcover edition due to our Hellboy campaign doing better than expected. We were all excited to have the unique opportunity to see this sketch version as a beautifully produced book.

We fulfilled all of our Kickstarter pledges in May 2018 and had some copies left. The remaining copies quickly sold out once we made them available for sale through our Flesk website. This sketch version was a rare glimpse into how Gianni prepares to illustrate a story.

“We had spent a couple of years working on the book in between other projects,” explains Marcelo. “The fusion of illustrated book and cinematic retelling of Lovecraft’s famous story drove us to push what we could do with the story, placing the emphasis on the mystery of the cult and the protagonist’s detective work rather than the creature itself.”

In June of 2020 I emailed Gary about the idea to reprint The Illustrated Call of Cthulhu. This book did not have a wide release and I thought it may be something worthwhile to try in the book trade market. I asked Gary and Marcelo how they felt about a release, possibly with a new cover.

Not long afterward, I received an email from Marcelo saying, “Gary is going to redo nearly all the images, including putting some of them into color, so really, it will be a very different book!” I immediately responded to share my enthusiasm and support. At Marcelo’s request, I worked with the printer to determine a slightly larger size at 6.5 x 9.5” to provide some more white space around the art and text. This provided Marcelo with a little more breathing room that he was hoping for.  

“Wanting to keep the freshness of Gary’s initial sketches we decided to finish the book in pencil and soft colors,” offers Marcelo.

Gary immediately got to work to refine and finish the pencil art. By early November 2020 they were already two-thirds of the way done. Marcelo was completely redesigning the book as Gary provided new art. I loved the new direction with the adjusted type. I had started this whole process merely by asking if we could reprint the existing book. I never expected Gary and Marcelo’s enthusiasm to take the book in a whole new direction.

On February 2, 2021 I saw the finished revised edition of the book. My response: “This new edition is gorgeous. We're amazed at all of the time and energy that you poured into finishing the drawings, as well as the updated improvements in the design that Marcelo added. The text placement is also refined and very well done, making for a beautiful all new package.”

At this stage Marcelo provided us with the packaged book that Kathy and I reviewed and ran our final pre-printer checks on. The book was turned into the printer on March 3, 2021 and arrived with us here in our Flesk warehouse in July 2021. This book became available on our Flesk website on Monday, August 9, 2021.

After over a decade, we had the original vision in all of our hands. “Finally, after many years we finished in time for John to publish the book as we wanted,” exclaimed Marcelo.

Working with Marcelo and Gary is about a smooth a process as you could hope for. Both are professionals of the highest caliber who I am fortunate to learn from. Marcelo is a rare individual who can edit, write, design and fully package a book. He was in charge of the Wandering Star series of books that were exquisite and served as an inspiration for me to get started in publishing.

This new edition of The Call of Cthulhu: A Mystery in Three Parts is a passion project. One born out a passion for H. P. Lovecraft, the passion for illustrated stories, and the passion for traditionally made books. It’s our pleasure to bring this book to you.

— John Fleskes

About the The Call of Cthulhu by H. P. Lovecraft

Written in 1928, H.P. Lovecraft’s The Call of Cthulhu defined the ancient gods as dark creatures who came from the stars and ruled the world before mankind. When these ancient ones awaken, humanity is plagued by a nightmare of terrors etched upon an epic backdrop. The author’s concept deeply redefined the horror story with this thrilling, dense mystery that spawned a virtual genre.

The artist Gary Gianni and designer Marcelo Anciano both felt that Lovecraft’s short story presented an opportunity to visually expand the Cthulhu Mythos and push the boundaries of illustrated books. Intense and fast-paced, the tale enabled them to explore graphic storytelling and illustrate the text in a unique way. It was a personal project for Gianni, who drew upon his decades of experience in illustrating numerous books and graphic novels.

The Call of Cthulhu, as illustrated by Gary Gianni, is a fusion of cinematic design, the graphic novel and illustrated books. Over a hundred finished pencil drawings with color pieces enhance and bring to life the work of two visionaries—Lovecraft and Gianni—in an extraordinary feat of storytelling and art.

H.P. Lovecraft’s original text has been revised in this book to exclude racial terms.

About H.P. Lovecraft:

Howard Phillips Lovecraft was responsible for creating the Cthulhu Mythos, a cycle of loosely related stories concerning “the Great Ones.” These are cosmic beings who took up residence on Earth long before humans inhabited the planet. Now they awaken to wreak havoc upon mankind. Born in 1890 in Providence, Rhode Island, Lovecraft was a sickly child whose parents died insane. When he was 16, he wrote the astronomy column in the Providence Tribune. Between 1908 and 1923, he wrote short stories for Weird Tales magazine, among others. He died in Providence—in poverty—on March 15, 1937. After his death, his colleagues August Derleth and Donald Wandrei collected Lovecraft’s stories and made arrangement for their publication. These writings have had a great impact on modern popular culture and have influenced and inspired many other writers, including Robert E. Howard, Clive Barker, Stephen King and Neil Gaiman.

About Gary Gianni:

Gary Gianni began as an illustrator for Chicago newspapers and as a reporter/sketch artist for television. He has illustrated books by authors ranging from Melville and Verne to Michael Chabon and Ray Bradbury. Gianni spent several years illustrating the stories of Conan, Solomon Kane and Bran Mak Morn in a series of books by R.E. Howard. In comics, he worked on Batman, The Shadow, Hellboy and his own creation, Monstermen. For almost a decade, he produced the syndicated newspaper comic strip Prince Valiant. Gianni also created drawings and paintings for George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire epic novels. Currently he is finishing the illustrations for Neil Gaiman’s Death and Honey.

About Marcelo Anciano:

Marcelo Anciano has been producing limited-edition books for decades. He was pivotal in instigating the current fashion of small press books with Wandering Star publications and the Robert E. Howard library of classics, reprinted as trade paperbacks by DelRey/Random House and translated worldwide. Authors like George R.R. Martin and Neil Gaiman and artists like Gary Gianni and Greg Manchess have asked Anciano to design fine editions of their work.

During the formation of the music videos during in the 1980s, Anciano directed over 100 music videos and commercials. For a decade, he worked with talents as diverse as Duran Duran, Peter Gabriel, Little Richard and Arnold Schwarzenegger, often designing their visual look and marketing. He also has produced and written a number of feature films—including Modesty Blaise, Solomon Kane and Semana Santa—but his passion has always been fine books.

Anciano notes that his collection of books actually has caused his house to become destabilized.