"TheArtStation and at <a href=https://strangehorizons.com/wordpress/author/arturo-lauria/"https://www.heavymetal.com/news/animation/ho99o9-master-of-pain-video-heavy-metal/attachment/ho99o9-spread-1000px/">Heavy Metal</a>." />
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The Gardener's First Rule, ©2019 Arturo Ibrido

The Gardener's First Rule, ©2019 Arturo Ibrido

Arturo Lauria, also known as Moloch or Dr.Brain, is a 30yrs old visual artist and author based in Italy. He comes from a small village in the Deep South of Italy, and now lives in Florence.

In 2012 he earned a nomination by Treviso comicbook festival, as “revelation author of the year”, in 2013 won the first prize at the Geekie Awards with Colonus, a dark sci-fi graphic novel written by Ken Pisani, drawn by Arturo, published by Dark Horse comics. During the last years he also collaborated with Top Cow, Ed.ink, Heavy Metal magazine and Sergio Bonelli editore, for which he’s working on his second story of Dylan Dog, the famous paranormal detective character from the Italian publisher.

You can contact him at arturoibrido@gmail.com, or find his work at ArtStation and at Heavy Metal.


Arturo Lauria in our archives
Current Issue
16 Mar 2026

The garden is the resting place of your vulnerabilities; there’s a reason you’ve left them here instead of carrying them with you. Typically you enter hardened and hurried, beelining straight for the correct plot and quickly releasing whatever is clutched in your hand without a second thought—today, an attempted weaving of leather and lace, strength and suppleness that your body cannot figure out how to wear, nor your words to narrate.
If you say there are rats, I will believe you, though I don’t hear or see them.
A ruffling of branches as they resettle for the night. We dare not ask why they are here.
Spec Fic and the Politics of Identity 
As part of a collective of African writers who have created an Afrocentric Sauútiverse of five planets, two suns and a spirit moon, a world of science and fantasy, where there is no written language, we play with technology and sound magic to scrutinise the world as we know it, and use speculative fiction as a response to our world. 
Friday: When Among Crows and To Clutch a Razor by Veronica Roth 
Issue 9 Mar 2026
By: Lio Abendan
Podcast read by: Jenna Hanchey
Strange Horizons
2 Mar 2026
Strange Horizons invites non-fiction submissions for our March 30 special issue on “Fungi in SFF.”
Issue 2 Mar 2026
Strange Horizons
Issue 23 Feb 2026
Issue 16 Feb 2026
Issue 9 Feb 2026
Issue 2 Feb 2026
By: Natasha King
Podcast read by: Jenna Hanchey
Issue 26 Jan 2026
Issue 19 Jan 2026
Issue 12 Jan 2026
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