What are the Vampire Hunter D art books?
Five books hold the art: two Amano retrospectives, a guide, a 647-page storyboard tome, and the 2026 complete interiors.
Because Amano's illustrations are half the series' identity, Vampire Hunter D grew a second shelf of art and reference books alongside the novels. Unusually, several of them carry original Kikuchi fiction inside, which makes them hunted by readers as well as art collectors. Two of the five were published in English by Dark Horse; the rest remain Japanese only.
THE AMANO BOOKS
Coffin and the Art CollectionCoffin · November 1997
Asahi Sonorama, ISBN 4-257-03500-5. Amano's retrospective of fourteen years of D art, nearly every illustration, print, and sketch to that date, plus an original Kikuchi story, Portrait of Yzobel. Its English edition, Coffin: The Art of Vampire Hunter D, arrived on 4 October 2006.
A first in English, hiding in Japanese
The Japanese Coffin included Kevin Leahy's English translation of Portrait of Yzobel, making a story inside a 1997 Japanese art book the first piece of Vampire Hunter D literature ever published in English, eight years before the novels crossed over.
Yoshitaka Amano Art Collection · 20 September 2000
ISBN 4-257-03606-0. The second retrospective, with another original story, Village in Fog. English edition, Yoshitaka Amano: The Collected Art of Vampire Hunter D, 12 December 2007.
THE REFERENCE SHELF
Guide and storyboardsVampire Hunter "D" Reader's Guide · June 2001
Sonorama Bunko, ISBN 4-257-03546-3. Rare art, Kikuchi's writing process, five short stories, and a full glossary. The Japanese edition adds a conversation between Kikuchi and Bloodlust director Yoshiaki Kawajiri; the English edition (21 September 2010) expands the glossary to nearly two hundred pages, closer to an encyclopedia.
Kawajiri's Storyboard Collection · 30 April 2001
ISBN 4-257-03633-8. Six hundred forty-seven pages of Yoshiaki Kawajiri's storyboards for Bloodlust, the film's entire visual plan on paper. Never published in English.
The Complete Illustration Collection · January 2026
Published with the forty-fourth volume to mark the end of Amano's interior run: every interior illustration he drew for the series, compiled in one book. The newest object on this shelf, and the natural capstone of it.