Introducing Paperface
A visage ripped from the wounded imaginations of a thousand thousand horror writers...
Here’s the First Word on Horror poster featuring our new mascot, Paperface.
We’re looking to build out some lore for him… who’s got ideas? Post them in the comments below.
Artwork is by the legendary horror artist Trevor Henderson. A shining star in the genre art world, Trevor is a true-champion of horror everywhere, possesses an incredible imagination, and is an all around amazing person to work with.
Checkout his work here.
Reminder: First Word on Horror episodes start in February. Paid subscribers get every episode in its entirety; free subscribers get a sample.
…Paperface is waiting for you to join us…
Thousands of patrons had visited the horror section of the old library. Over the years, a fresh print or overly excited page turn took a piece of each reader. Papercuts. A little gasp, a little pain, a little blood. Each minute stain it's own dog ear of fright.
When the levee broke, the old library drowned. What the water and mud didn't take got finished by the mold. Down in the horror section, the volumes swirled and churned. They steeped in the dark waters until one story couldn't pull itself from the rest. Together, bound in the blood and shivers of the readers, stained by a psychic deluge of fear, the pages evolved into a will.
When the waters receded, the sun tried to banish what had coalesced in the storm. It dried the surface, but couldn't reach deeper.
That night, a reader who had loved the chill and thrill of the books visited the ruin to see what they could salvage. Not a tome remained, though the ground was plastered with pulp and words. They didn't know why they knelt down and sunk their fingers into the muck, or why they wanted nothing more than to feel the cool, leafy midden on their face.
The pages, on the other hand, did. They had new stories to tell, and many legacies if horror to share.
My great grandma used to tell me stories about a man made of paper who would come in the night if you fell asleep reading a book.