As a little boy, Pete Von Sholly had a great imagination. And over the years, that gift has served this 70-year-old very well.
"I always say I'm very old, but I'm very immature," said Von Sholly.
He describes himself as someone "spreading the weird." Now, he has taken that "weird" and turned it into a new book. I'd like to call it a real pager turner, but in reality, the book is one continuous page of monster art.
"Well, it's mural. That's the thing and it's--how do you put a mural in a book?" said Von Sholly. "So Clover Press, they figured out a way to have their printer print it as one thing. So finally, it can be seen as one piece of art. People don't realize that it's not a bunch of pictures. It's one huge picture."
End to end, the book's "one page" is 18 feet long, and it includes more than 1,000 drawings. You can be "in-the-know" about all these monsters: There's a separate guide to help you put names to all the faces.
"It's like a parade in my head ... It's like a parade of monsters which parallel human history," said Von Sholly. "I want to see it in a museum someday. That's my dream to have it along a really long wall so people can walk and look at it."
Von Sholly has spent decades working in the art departments of various movies, many featuring monsters!
"They're just fascinating. Everybody likes monsters, don't they?" said Von Sholly.
"Pete Von Sholly's History of Monsters" is available to order now from Clover Press or on Amazon. It'll be officially available in stores June 29.