A comic book in words, episodic and eerie, The Haunted
Hillbilly is a carnivalesque thrill-ride that reads both like a
vintage 1950s issue of Tales from the Crypt and a 21st century
re-imagining of Michael Ondaatje's The Collected Works of Billy the
Kid. The Haunted Hillbilly is an historical first-person narrative,
told by Nudie "The Carnival Couturier" (the name's a twist on
"Nudie, the Rodeo Tailor", a real-life figure perhaps best known
for dressing Elvis Presley), a gay couturier who, in Derek
McCormack's spellbinding world, also happens to be a vampire. As
the story evolves, with its magical poetic cadence, Nudie makes,
then breaks, the career of country-and-western legend Hank
Williams.