Violenzia and Other Deadly Amusements By Richard Sala, $17, Fantagraphics Books.

Richard Sala excels at drawing two things: beautiful, rosy-cheeked young women and hideous, scary monster-men. His latest book gives him ample opportunity to do both. The title story is that of a mysterious woman hell-bent on gunning down a list of sinister operations all run by an equally mysterious villain in a Rasputin mask. Like much of Sala’s recent work, it’s full of vague, David Lynch-ian weirdness, but the mode is more pulpy and action-packed than his usual spooky-toned mystery-horror.

And The Other Deadly Amusements of the title? There’s a black-and-white horror story that reads like illustrated prose; there’s a second, shorter Violenzia story; and there’s a rather astounding abecedarian section. This features 26 full-page illustrations, each corresponding to a different letter of the alphabet—some silly (“An Afternoon of Apalling Apparitions”) and some sounding like B-movie titles (“Labyrinth of Lunatics”). Think Edward Gorey’s Gashlycrumb Tinies meets classic Roger Corman on a Golden Age Hollywood backlot.

Featuring page after page of a visual compromise between flat, angular cartooning and rich, vibrant painting, Violenzia not only represents Sala’s incredible range, but also Sala at his very best, which is pretty incredible.