Concrete by Paul Chadwick: History, Every Volume & the New Series
A Stone Giant Walks Again Paul Chadwick's Concrete returns after fourteen years
Some of the most quietly human stories comics has ever produced star a seven-foot, half-ton man made of stone. This June, after fourteen years away, he comes back.
Dark Horse is marking its fortieth anniversary by reviving the very character it was born with. Concrete: Stars Over Sand is a five-part story of amnesia, wilderness, and slow-burning suspense — the first all-new Concrete since 2012, and creator Paul Chadwick says it represents roughly a decade's work.
Concrete has wandered into the desert and not come back. Struck by lightning and stripped of his memory, he roams the arid mountains confused and frightened, convinced he is being hunted — while his friends Larry and Maureen race a looming deadline to find him. "Everything I know about suspense," Chadwick says, "I've tried to do here."
On sale June 17, 2026 · Price $4.99 · Writer / Artist Paul Chadwick
Covers Wraparound oil paintings by Chadwick
Who Is Concrete?The Man Inside the Stone
Beneath the rock is Ronald Lithgow, a congressional speechwriter. On a backcountry camping trip, Ron and a friend were abducted by mysterious aliens who transplanted his brain into a massive artificial body — over seven feet tall, more than a thousand pounds, sheathed in a stonelike shell. His friend didn't survive. Ron escaped, and to explain his existence the government floated a cover story: he's a cybernetic experiment, nicknamed "Concrete." His real identity stays buried.
The body is a paradox. It grants enormous strength, near-invulnerability, the ability to walk the ocean floor and hold his breath for hours. But Chadwick built in cruel limits: dense eyes that see poorly, fingers too clumsy to hold a pen, no sense of taste or touch, and a complete severance from ordinary human intimacy. Concrete is constantly snapping doorknobs and crushing telephones; he hires an assistant, Larry Munro, simply to write for him, and is shadowed by a scientist, Dr. Maureen Vonnegut, assigned to study him.
What makes the series remarkable is what it isn't. Aside from the aliens and the body itself, there are no superpowers, no villains, no science-fiction machinery — just real-world physics and a thoughtful man trying to live an extraordinary life. Concrete swims the channel, climbs mountains, takes odd jobs, falls in with environmental militants, and wrestles, in long interior monologues, with loneliness, art, ambition, and what it means to be human when you no longer have a human body.
He first appeared in Dark Horse Presents #1 in July 1986 — the inaugural issue of the inaugural comic from a brand-new publisher called Dark Horse. The story, "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous," ran in a book that sold out 30,000 copies in its first week. Forty years later, both the character and the company are still here.
The CreatorPaul Chadwick
Born in Seattle in 1957 and raised in the suburb of Medina, Paul Chadwick caught the comics bug young, taking part in amateur press fanzines as a teenager. He graduated from the Art Center College of Design in 1979 with a degree in illustration and went straight into Hollywood, drawing storyboards for Disney, Warner Bros. and Lucasfilm on films including Pee-wee's Big Adventure, The Big Easy and Miracle Mile.
His first major comics work was the final run of Marvel's Dazzler in 1985 — but it was the character he created the next year that defined him. Concrete debuted in 1986 and quickly became one of the most acclaimed independent comics of its era, written, drawn, and painted entirely by Chadwick himself.
Beyond Concrete, Chadwick wrote the Vertigo miniseries Gifts of the Night, drew arcs of Star Wars: Empire and a run on The World Below, illustrated Harlan Ellison's 7 Against Chaos graphic novel, and — in an unexpected turn — was tapped by the Wachowskis to write the story for the MMORPG The Matrix Online. But he has returned to his stone giant again and again across four decades, and Stars Over Sand is the latest homecoming.
Why It MattersA Wall of Acclaim
For a black-and-white book about a contemplative rock man, Concrete collected an astonishing amount of hardware. It swept the early Eisner Awards and remains a fixture on "best graphic novels" lists decades later.
"...probably the best comic being published today by anyone, anywhere." — Harlan Ellison
Frank Miller called the suspense of Killer Smile "edge-of-your-seat... full of unpredictable twists and turns," and Time profiled Chadwick's work as some of the most humane in the medium. All told, the character has gathered dozens of industry awards and nominations since 1986.
The LibraryWhere to Start — Every Concrete Title
The cleanest way in is Dark Horse's seven-volume collected edition, which gathers the original series and miniseries in reading order alongside the short stories. Here's the shelf, in order, with what each book holds.
Depths
The beginning. Ron Lithgow wakes inside his new stone shell and tries to build a life — walking the ocean floor, helping on a family farm, learning the limits and freedoms of a body that can't feel a human hand. The foundational stories, plus the Eisner-nominated "Orange Glow" and Chadwick's autobiographical "Vagabond."
Heights
Concrete's celebrity grows and his ambitions get bigger — scaling peaks, peeling back car roofs like a pull-tab, testing just how far this body can take him. Includes "World Beneath the Skin," "Brighter," and a gallery of hard-to-find illustrations.
Fragile Creature
A film producer hires Concrete to save money on a low-budget sci-fi movie's effects budget — who needs a costume when your star is genuinely made of stone? An Eisner-winning meditation on creativity, compromise, and the fragile people who make art. Bundled with "Little Pushes," "Byrdland's Secret," and more.
Killer Smile
Chadwick's darkest work. Assistant Larry Munro is taken hostage by a psychotic gunman and forced to chauffeur him on a road trip bound for disaster. A harrowing thriller Frank Miller praised for its relentless, edge-of-your-seat suspense.
Think Like a Mountain
A group of radical eco-warriors invites Concrete to witness — and write about — their campaign to save old-growth forest. What starts as a lark becomes a harrowing test of conviction, forcing him to choose between detached observer and committed participant. Winner of a 1996 Parents' Choice Award.
Strange Armor
The definitive retelling of the origin. A troubled man seeking renewal in the wilderness is reborn as a walking monolith — then becomes both an overnight celebrity and the target of government operatives desperate to bury the truth of his transformation. The best single entry point for new readers who want the whole story.
The Human Dilemma
Chadwick's most mature work, and his first Concrete in six years. Concrete is recruited as the face of a controversial campaign to pay people not to have children, while Larry and Maureen navigate a proposal of a more personal kind. A thoughtful, provocative look at overpopulation that won Chadwick the 2005 Eisner Award for Best Writer/Artist.
Stars Over Sand
The long-awaited return. Lightning-struck and amnesiac, Concrete wanders the desert a danger to himself and others, certain he's being hunted, while Larry and Maureen mount a desperate search against a ticking clock. A decade in the making, set in places Chadwick has personally camped and sketched, with wraparound oil-painting covers — and, he says, everything he knows about suspense.