Encyclopaedia of Hell by Satan: book preview

Our friends at Feral House have published a bizarre and funny book in the vein of Ambrose Bierce's Devil's Dictionary, called Encyclopaedia of Hell by Satan: An Invasion Manual for Demons Concerning the Planet Earth and the Human Race Which Infests It. It was written by accomplished comedy writer Martin Olson, and designed by the wonderful Sean Tejaratchi creator of the exquisite Crap Hound clip art zine.

A tour de force of darkness, Encyclopaedia of Hell is a manual of Earth written by Lord Satan for his invading hordes of demons, complete with hundreds of unpleasant illustrations, diagrams, and a comprehensive and utterly repulsive dictionary of Earth terms.

Since the customs and mores of humanity are alien and inconceivable to demons, Satan wrote this strangely poetic military handbook for the enlightenment and edification of his demon armies. A masterpiece expressing Satan's hatred for humanity and himself, the Encyclopaedia includes "Techniques of Stalking and Eating Humans," "Methods of Canning Human Pus," and "Dicing and Slicing Orphaned Children."

Why the invasion? During the last century in particular, Hell has become seriously overcrowded. Satan needs more land mass for the damned and to use the human livestock to feed his hungry demon invaders. Since this book is the 666th commemorative edition, this Encyclopaedia contains special commemorative material.

Here's a video of Ed Asner at his foul-mouthed best, cursing the praises of the book.

Martin Olson will be doing a signing at Comicon, Friday and Saturday (July 22 and 23), from 11 - 12. Geekscape will be hosting him at booth number 4016. And here's a link to a PDF preview of Encyclopaedia of Hell.

Buy Encyclopaedia of Hell on Amazon.

• [Anonymous]

  Surely this occurred to just about everybody. But if you’re going to do this gag don’t you just go ahead and refer to it as the “Encyclopedia Satanica”?

• [Anonymous]

  That was absolutely the best book trailer I’ve ever seen. On the other hand, it didn’t particularly make me want to buy the book.

• [feralman]

  Congratulations, Remote Viewers! Y’all know so much!

  To bring some posters up to date: This is the 666th Edition of this book, and Satan, who wrote this book, is not big on Vatican II.

  • [efergus3]

    Actually it’s 616 not 666. Look it up.

• [Eye Open Doors]

  I am surprised that The Screwtape Letters are not mentioned.

  • [grikdog]

    Mod upped.

• [Anonymous]

  Very reminiscent of Ambrose Bierce’s The Devil’s Dictionary. (Which, I believe, is now in the public domain. Don’t quote me on that, though.)

• [Anonymous]

  i don’t get why the ae latin dipthong is used in the title… just because the catholic church killed the latin language doesn’t mean Satan was a latin speaker…

• [MacBookHeir]

  After looking at this post again, it dawned on me that Satan has already written an Encyclopaedia of Hell – it’s called “The Complete Series of Harry Potter Books” – quite gruesome, I must say…

• [efergus3]

  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/616_(number)#The_Number_of_the_Beast

• [mahendra singh]

  Screwtape Letters not mentioned because the author was secretly on Satan’s side (duh). Satan writes in Latin because he is trying to confuse you. That’s why Martin’s book is so important. He won’t confuse you, he’s a comedic genius, not a confusing genius.

• [MacBookHeir]

  With all good comedy and parody the basic premise has to be accepted. I’m not sure if the basic premise in this case is clear. Why would the customs and mores of humanity be “alien and inconceivable to demons”? Also, any theologian knows that Hell is infinite and never-ending. By its very nature it cannot become “overcrowded” – there’s a great illuminated book by William Blake that covers a lot of this Heaven and Hell stuff (The Marriage of Heaven and Hell) and it’s pretty darn funny and it adheres to Biblical teachings regarding Hell. as I said, the premise has to be reasonable for comedy to stick.