David B. - Böcker

The most acclaimed European graphic novel of the last ten years, Epileptic is David B.'s story of his brother's battle with epilepsy - but it turns into a penetrating and sometimes lacerating self-examination on the author's part, as he delves into his own complex emotions and his family's troubled history, as well as his own youthful fantasy life. Particularly pointed is his description of the family journey from one attempted cure to another, including acupuncture, spiritualism and macrobiotics. David B.'s drawing is utterly extraordinary, balancing literal representation and expressionist psychological distortion.

Praise for Incidents in the Night Book 1: finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize (Graphic Novel category): "One of 10 Best Comics and Graphic Novels of the year."--Time "A treat for sophisticated adult story omnivores with a taste for bizarre mysteries."--Library Journal "Incidents owes more than a bit to Jorge Luis Borges's short stories."--Douglas Wolk, The Washington Post At the end of first Incidents in the Night, David B. met an uncertain demise in a bizarre cliffhanger. In Book 2, the worlds of Epileptic and Incidents in the Night become entangled as the author's dead brother, Jean-Christophe, joins the cast to solve the mystery and uncover the occult machinations of the mad editor, Emile Travers. Book 2 is another treat for lovers of books and literary mysteries. Once again the translation is by acclaimed novelist Brian Evenson. David B. is one of the world's finest cartoonists and a co-founder of the legendary L'Association collective. He is the author of many graphic novels including Epileptic, which was awarded Angouleme International Comics Festival Prize for Scenario and the Ignatz Award for Outstanding Artist.Brian Evenson is the author of eleven prize-winning books of fiction, including The Open Curtain, Last Days, Windeye, and Immobility. His work has been translated into over a dozen languages. He lives and works in Providence, Rhode Island, where he teaches at Brown University.

1919 – the defeated Austro-Hungarian Empire is losing control of the city port of Fiume to pirates. A self-styled "Pirate King", Gabriele d'Annunzio (poet, Italian war hero and Dadaist) storms the city with 3000 loyal Italian footsoldiers. He declares Fiume a free Republic: a utopian city-state, with himself as Commander. The city soon descends into looting and surreal decadence, reminiscent of the last days of Rome. Amid this chaos, the beautiful Mina, a black-haired young singer, is lost in this city gone mad, consumed by a love affair with a young soldier. Haunted by the horror of the trenches, a soldier, Lauriano, hunts Fiume's alleys in vain for the ghost that haunts his dreams.

Filiu and David B. draw striking parallels between ancient and contemporary political history in this look at the US-Middle East conflict. The reader is transported to the pirate-choked Mediterranean sea, where Christians and Muslims continue the crusades, only this time on water. As the centuries pass, the traditional victims of the Muslim pirates--the British, French, and Spanish--all become empire-building powers whose sights lie beyond the Mediterranean.