I see that Chaosium’s 2006 one-volume Malleus Monstrorum was republished in two handsome volumes at the end of 2020. Originally a 300-page oversize compendium of the Call of Cthulhu RPG mythos monsters and gods, illustrated… “entirely with classic works of art and vintage photos, some real, many cleverly forged” as one reviewer put it. Of course it slithered into Derleth territory and even stretched to Ramsey Campbell, Brian Lumley, and Colin Wilson — but failed to embrace the Dreamlands since that was done in another Chaosium book. “Lovecraft fans interested in the book for non-gaming purposes will probably be disappointed” the reviewer of the 2006 edition usefully concludes, thus saving writers cash and disappointment.

Still, it’s worth a quick flick-through in PDF just for the clever art. Also to know what to avoid. I mean that it may be ‘negatively’ useful for writers who need to be sure that their ‘new’ monster is not actually similar to what has already been done in the extended Mythos. In that sense this could be a useful second-opinion after the un-illustrated Cthulhu Mythos Encyclopedia and other sources such as the Dreamlands book.

However, the budget PDF version of the 2006 original has been removed from sale, and the paper is now at ‘collectable’ prices. Previews of the new 2020 two-volume set suggest why — the old 2006 layout is gone… its eccentric home-brew mix of “classic works of art and vintage photos” has been removed and replaced by more generic ‘fantasy card-art’ style illustrations. These are presumably unlikely to puzzle today’s card-collecting kiddies, or to offend the Holy Inquisition of the Perpetual Outrage.

New edition.

Old edition