Suspense #23

Atlas Comics delivered genuine chills with Suspense #23 (1952), a 52-page anthology promising "Tales to Hold You in a Grip of Eerie Suspense!" Bill Everett's cover art sets the tone vividly: a horrified man stumbles through a moonlit graveyard while a monstrous, clawed creature looms from the shadows, bats wheel overhead, and a gravestone inscription ominously marks "the only mortal who ever came to the undead of his own free will." Three stories are teased — "Vampire, Beware!", "The Man in Black," and "Death and Mr. Marko!" — each previewed in small panels that hint at shadowy figures and dancing skeletons, making this a satisfying package of pre-Comics Code macabre fun.