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Review :
Pascal Blanchet is a young author from Quebec publishing here his second graphic novel, after La fugue, published in 2005.
One could believe the story told in this book entirely fictional but it is actually based on true facts. This feeling of reading a fiction might come from Blanchet’s art, very distinctive, influenced by the art-deco movement I would say. It makes me think of posters or animations from the first half of the XX century... which does not convey a very realistic rendering to the action.
This story - starting in the late 1920s and ending in the early 1970s - is focused on the human, social and industrial adventure that was the installation and operation of an hydroelectric dam in Quebec, not far from Trois-Rivières, where the author was born.
One of the main assets of this book resides in Pascal Blanchet’s original art, startling mix of illustration and sequential art, highlighted by a very fine set of colors with brown/orange shades. I say "mix" because of the pretty unusual graphic narrative of the author, depending on pages that are panels, or the reverse if you prefer. There is thus no classical narrative sequence within a page so to speak (which does not prevent movement and narrative within the page). Panel margins are thus page margins here, gutters pouring outside of the book in a way. Hence, the pace is given much more than usual by turning the pages (you put your fingers in the gutters then) rather than by following the panels composition within the page.
Talking about pace and narrative, the author’s style, more particularly in characters depiction, give quite a musical feeling, rather jazzy I have to say [1]. A musicality which might also be involved in the narrative or move feeling that we can have within a page, as mentioned previously.
As a matter of fact, the author considers himself as a musician failure. He composes his books as if it was music : "Actually, drawing come very late in the creation process. The music, that’s what unleashes the processus, what gives the tone of the book; the story grows around a piece of music, solos, atmospheres." [2]. A list of musics that could follow the narrative from the 1920s to the end of the 1970s is indicated at the end of the book. I would be happy to see a second publication of the book with a CD album inside...
