Hwy. 115 - Hardcover

Lehmann, Matthias

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1560977337 ISBN 13: 9781560977339

Publisher: Fantagraphics, 2006

Synopsis

This road-movie crime story is a masterful debut graphic novel from France.

A road movie featuring two detectives, Rene and Agatha, on the tracks of Robert Illot, a serial killer whose modus operandi is to suffocate his victim with various objects (including chickens and lightbulbs) along the highways and byways of France. As they get closer and closer to catching up with him, seeking out and interrogating men and women from his past life at the insane asylum, he always stays one step ahead and the row of corpses grows longer and longer In this lengthy original graphic novel by Matthias Lehmann (his first, released to great acclaim in his native France earlier this year), dreams and flashbacks converge with the ongoing narrative, done in Lehmann's hypnotically intense and insanely labor-intensive woodcut style to form a dark and disquieting vision of humanity.

About this title

About the Author:

Matthis Lehmann lives in Paris, France. His work has been published in Lapin and Dirty Stories.

From School Library Journal:

Grade 10 Up—This cynical, twisted tale of murder and mayhem bespeaks of several genres: horror, noir, you-think-you-know-whodunit, and road trip. Detective Rene Pluriel traverses dark alleys, dank hotel rooms, and sinister country settings populated by seamy characters in order to interview mental-patient acquaintances of the serial killer he is tracking. Woven throughout are occasionally confusing backstories, including a recurring motif of an abused little boy locked in a dark room, that leave readers wondering if something was lost in the translation. The large, stand-alone black-and-white panels of exquisitely rendered, highly detailed scratchboard art capture an R. Crumb-like drawing style but lack Crumb's humor and humanity. The dark, scratchy drawings with their highly stylized, sleazy, self-possessed characters and bleak, moody settings further accentuate the dark nail-biter of a narrative. Violence and exploitive sex throughout make this a title that will have appeal to a segment of older teen readers of adult graphic novels.—Jodi Mitchell, Durham County Library, NC
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About this edition

• Publisher: Fantagraphics
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 1560977337
• ISBN 13: 9781560977339
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 240