John Carpenter’s The Thing is a classic science fiction horror film that has scared audiences for decades. But the film was inspired by an earlier story published in the 1930s, “Who Goes There?” by noted editor John W. Campbell Jr., and it turns out that that there’s more to that story. A researcher recently discovered an unpublished, novel-length manuscript of the story, and a small press is using Kickstarter to publish it.

Campbell is best known as the long-time editor of Astounding Science Fiction (now Analog Science Fact and Fiction), one of the most influential science fiction magazines of all time. But before he took over the publication in 1937, he worked for years as an author, often writing under the name Don A. Stuart. In his book Astounding: John W. Campbell, Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlein, L. Ron Hubbard, and the Golden Age of Science Fiction (due out next week), Alec Nevala-Lee notes that Campbell was inspired in part by explorer Richard Byrd, and possibly H.P. Lovecraft’s classic horror story “At the Mountains of Madness.” In 1938, a novella-length story called “Who Goes There?” appeared in Astounding, which went on to become a favorite within the science fiction fan community. The story was later adapted in 1951 as The Thing from Another World, while John Carpenter’s remake The Thing arrived three decades later. A prequel to Carpenter’s film, also titled The Thing, came out in 2011.

“I couldn’t believe what I found there”

While researching his book, Nevala-Lee discovered that “Who Goes There?” wasn’t the first version of the story: Campbell had written a novel-length story, which he then shortened for publication in Astounding. Nevala-Lee went through all of Campbell’s surviving letters while researching his book, and came across a reference to a box of manuscripts that he had sent to Harvard. “I hadn’t heard about this anywhere else,” Nevala-Lee told The Verge, “and it doesn’t pop up on a casual search online, but I finally tracked down an entry in the catalog at [Harvard’s] Houghton Library.” Inside, he found the original, complete manuscript of Frozen Hell. “I couldn’t believe what I found there.”

Nevala-Lee says that while Campbell had mentioned Frozen Hell a couple of times, but never indicated that it was a novel. “I don’t think anybody had any idea that it existed,” he explained. He notes that the original story features an entirely new opening, and a “huge, 45-page section that describes the discovery of the alien spacecraft.” By comparison, the version that was ultimately published condensed much of that down.

“There are some interesting details in the restored draft, but the really fascinating thing is how it alters the structure of the entire story, which changes halfway through from a science fiction adventure into horror. I love that kind of unexpected shift in tone, and while I can see why Campbell decided to edit it down to focus on the psychological side, there’s something very modern—and effective—in the way that it switches abruptly from one genre to another.”

He then reached out to Campbell’s daughter Leslyn, who pointed him to John Gregory Betancourt, who manages Campbell’s literary estate and an independent publishing imprint called Wildside Press. Betancourt told The Verge that Nevala-Lee’s discovery of the full story a “one-in-a-lifetime” event. “It’s like learning that your favorite book was cut for magazine publication, and now you get to read the full story,” he says. He explains that the fuller version of the book adds more character development and backstory, which was slimmed down for its magazine debut. Betancourt described the draft as “fragmentary and pieced together from a partial final draft and a rough draft,” which he” then compared to the published version of ‘Who Goes There?’” Betancourt says that he hopes that the final version lives up to what Campbell originally intended. “I have tried to craft the story into what John W. Campbell would have written, had it appeared in its full form, as originally written.”

The project has already surpassed its funding goal

On its Kickstarter page, Wildside Press says that its edition will include a cover drawn by artist Bob Eggleton, an introduction by author Robert Silverberg, and will come with a preview of a sequel story written by Betancourt. $7 will get backers an ebook edition of the story (as well as a copy of the original “Who Goes There,” and 10 additional ebooks), $12 will get you a paperback copy, and a $25 pledge will get you a hardcover edition. The project has since blown past its $1000 funding goal (it has pulled in nearly $16,000 as of this post’s publication), and the final version is expected to reach backers in January 2019.