A Haunt of Fears: The Strange History of the British Horror Comics Campaign #[nn]

Martin Barker's A Haunt of Fears: The Strange History of the British Horror Comics Campaign is a fascinating 1984 Pluto Press deep-dive into the moral panic that sought to ban horror comics in Britain. The cover sets the tone perfectly: a young girl sits absorbed in a comic book, unaware of the looming vampire-like shadow cast across the wall behind her, while a grasping hand reaches in from the right — and three grotesque medallion portraits labeled "The Hate Monger," "The Old Corrupter," and "The Child Reaper" line the left margin, neatly embodying the hysterical rhetoric that fueled the campaign. It's a sharp, knowing visual that captures exactly what Barker is examining — the gap between lurid fears and the actual comics kids were reading.