Are you ready for a children's book about monsters from Guillermo del Toro? Then we've got a nice surprise for you. Check out an exclusive peek at the front cover of del Toro's Trollhunters, which he co-wrote with author Daniel Kraus (Rotters).


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We haven't heard much about Trollhunters since 2010, when del Toro struck a deal with Dreamworks Animation to write and direct a Trollhunters movie. At that time, del Toro already had the book written and was planning on publishing it while he worked on directing the animated film. It's unclear if the movie is still happening (given that del Toro has a billion other projects on his slate) but the book is finally here. Back in 2010, here's how del Toro described the project:

I wanted very much to develop a story that could be written for kids but dealt with a genre that was scary. It essentially combines fairy tales with modern times and is about how difficult it is to be kid. Normally, kids are idealized in animated films. But the growing pains, married with the notion that there is a world right next to us that is completely plagued by creatures of ancient lore, it's thematically fitting with the rest of my stuff.


And here's the official synopsis of Trollhunters, which is aimed at kids 12 and up:

“You are food. Those muscles you flex to walk, lift, and talk? They're patties of meat topped with chewy tendon. That skin you've paid so much attention to in mirrors? It's delicious to the right tongues, a casserole of succulent tissue. And those bones that give you the strength to make your way in the world? They rattle between teeth as the marrow is sucked down slobbering throats. These facts are unpleasant but useful. There are things out there, you see, that don't cower in holes to be captured by us and cooked over our fires. These things have their own ways of trapping their kills, their own fires, their own appetites.” Jim Sturges is your typical teen in suburban San Bernardino —one with an embarrassingly overprotective dad, a best friend named “Tubby” who shares his hatred of all things torturous (like gym class), and a crush on a girl who doesn’t know he exists. But everything changes for Jim when a 45-year old mystery resurfaces, threatening the lives of everyone in his seemingly sleepy town. Soon Jim has to team up with a band of unlikely (and some un-human) heroes to battle the monsters he never knew existed. From the minds of horror geniuses Guillermo del Toro and Daniel Kraus comes a new illustrated novel about the fears that move in unseen places.

And here are the front and back covers. The book comes out July 7.


Contact the author at charliejane@io9.com .