| Issue | #12 |
| Published | November 1960 |
| Frequency | bi-monthly |
| Cover Price | 0.10 USD |
| Pages | 36 |
| Editing | Stan Lee |
| Notes | Distributed to newstands in June 1960. This issue includes 10 pages of paid advertisements. All new stories in this issue are narrated in the first person. Distribution date from Joseph Marek's Marvel Comics Group history website. |
| Characters | Gor-Kill |
| Genre | monsters |
| Pencils | Jack Kirby |
| Inks | Dick Ayers? George Klein? |
| Notes | George Klein ink credit by Nick Caputo. According to Marvel Masterworks, the cover inks of Tales of Suspense #11–20 were all by either Steve Ditko or Dick Ayers |
| Reprinted | in Marvel Masterworks: Atlas Era Tales of Suspense (Marvel, 2006 series) #2 (2008) |
| Characters | Gor-Kill; Hans Grubnik |
| Synopsis | A gaseous alien comes down to Earth and inhabits a dam of water to harass local villagers. The village loafer realizes that the alien is using the water in the dam to embody itself and steals dynamite in order blow up the pass before the alien can reach the sea. The loafer succeeds, but is imprisoned for stealing the dynamite. |
| Genre | monsters |
| Pencils | Jack Kirby |
| Inks | Dick Ayers |
| Reprinted | in Where Monsters Dwell (Marvel, 1970 series) #1 (January 1970); in Marvel Masterworks: Atlas Era Tales of Suspense (Marvel, 2006 series) #2 (2008) |
| Characters | Gus Harris; Mr. Peters |
| Synopsis | A boy without a family is given a vial filled with music, but squanders the inspiration of it. |
| Genre | occult |
| Pencils | Joe Maneely |
| Inks | Joe Maneely |
| Letters | typeset |
| Notes | Text story with illustrations. |
| Reprinted | from World of Fantasy (Marvel, 1956) #6 (March 1957) |
| Characters | Pierre; Kragok |
| Synopsis | A sadistic jailer buys a book detailing an alien civilization that has retreated below the Earth in order to avoid surface climate change in order to torment his prisoner with false hope of escape. The prisoner finds the book and believes the story and later he finds a working digger to bring him down to the aliens below who welcome him. The astonished jailer spends the rest of his life successfully attempting to locate another working digger. |
| Genre | science fiction |
| Pencils | Steve Ditko |
| Inks | Steve Ditko |
| Reprinted | in Fantasy Masterpieces (Marvel, 1966 series) #2 (April 1966); in Marvel Masterworks: Atlas Era Tales to Astonish (Marvel, 2006 series) #2 (2008) |
| Synopsis | A science fiction writer's imagination somehow makes the monster in his story real. He fights it until he can imagine it out of existence. |
| Genre | monsters |
| Pencils | Reed Crandall |
| Inks | Reed Crandall |
| Reprinted | in Where Monsters Dwell (Marvel, 1970 series) #4 (July 1970); in Marvel Masterworks: Atlas Era Tales to Astonish (Marvel, 2006 series) #2 (2008) |
| Characters | Rick Jordan |
| Synopsis | A sailor finds a note from a castaway, but on the island named he finds only a strange creature. When an alien ship arrives to pick up the creature, he realizes that it was a castaway. |
| Genre | science fiction |
| Pencils | Don Heck |
| Inks | Don Heck |
| Reprinted | in Where Monsters Dwell (Marvel, 1970 series) #4 (July 1970); in Marvel Masterworks: Atlas Era Tales to Astonish (Marvel, 2006 series) #2 (2008) |