Arlington-based comic book editor Jason Rodriguez's new graphic anthology, Postcards: True Stories that Never Happened, musters a cast of 33 cartoonists and lets them loose with the same premise: While accompanying his girlfriend on an antique-shopping trip, Rodriguez acquired a collection of decades-old postcards, the meanings of the cryptic, private messages scrawled on them long since lost to time. Rodriguez had each of his teams of creators choose one card and tell the story of the image and message it bears. The talent lineup ranges from mainstream figures like Phillip (Green Arrow) Hester and Michael (Alias) Gaydos to local heroes like Matt (Mr. Big) Dembicki; from gifted newcomers like Gia-Bao Tran to indie legends like Harvey (American Splendor) Pekar.

Image from "Tic-Tic Bang-Bang," written by Stuart Moore and illustrated by Michael Gaydos, from the anthology Postcards: True Stories that Never Happened.

The product of this experiment is a morose but thoroughly arresting collection, full of tales of war, disease, homesickness, thwarted love, loneliness and murder. And con men. (Apprently, no one ever sent a postcard in a fit of joy. Or maybe it’s just that happy stories are boring.) Yet the tales are so economically told — and the black-and-white artwork, despite the diversity of styles on display, is so uniformly superb — that you can’t help but be seduced by these vignettes of woe.

You’ll have your own favorites, but if you’re looking for one or two stories to read in the store while deciding whether this collection is your cup of bitter tea, check out Hester’s “A Joyous Eastertide,” or the heartbreaking “Cora’s Dress” by James W. Powell and Drew Gilbert. Meanwhile, the lighting-fast history of Pekar’s marriage to Joyce Brabner — scripted by the couple and drawn by Matt Kindt — that closes the book somehow manages to condense the humor, rage, ecstasy, fear, and boredom of a lifelong union into eight pages.

Postcards: True Stores That Never Happened is published today by Villard Books. Editor Jason Rodriguez and contributors Danielle Corsetto, Matt Dembicki, and Robert Tinnell appear at Olsson’s Dupont Circle tonight at 7 p.m. to discuss and sign copies of the book. Original artwork from the book, as well as some of the postcards that inspired its stories, will be on display.