The Secret (Paperback, Main)

In this atmospheric graphic novel, Klimowski tells the tale of a mysterious underworld into which the protagonist stumbles while searching for his wife and children. It is Christmas. The children receive a camera obscura, which they play with until bedtime. The father pops out to buy a packet of cigarettes and returns to find his family gone. He follows a trail which leads him through his own apartment building and his own fantasy world, his journey overshadowed by a giant camera obscura, which seems to be used for sinister purposes by a bizarre group of fanatics. This is a disturbing and dark 'read', skilfully combining the everyday with an otherworld of mutant creatures and hidden intentions. Klimowski's shadowy line-drawings are well suited to the noir style. Tinged with humour and eroticism, The Secret travels through the subconscious as well as the material world, raising the metaphysical question of whether our lives are merely shadows on the wall of Plato's cave - a possibility emphasized by the labyrinthine journey undertaken by the hero. This is a compelling and unsettling work, building on Klimowski's previous 'dream book', The Depository. Klimowski's style is deceptively simple. He can express great emotion with only a couple of pen strokes and his images conjure up a Kafka-esque vision of urban nightmare, while his use of frame-by-frame close-ups enhances the dream-like sense of claustrophobia. He truly understands the cinematic build-up of tension and uses it to good effect. This is a superb work in an exciting medium, moving the graphic novel concept inexorably forward. (Kirkus UK)

This is another disturbing novel without words by the Polish artist-illustrator of The Depository. The narrative is rendered entirely as a sequence of 300 pages of compelling drawings and photo-montages. The Secret projects an unsettling story about a young woman and her two children who vanish from their apartment one evening, leaving a distraught husband to follow a trail of sinister signs and traces left by their abductors. There is something alarming and almost occult in the forces at work in the background, and a turning point in the mystery is a giant camera obscura which ultimately envelops everything. The Secret, in its metamorphosis of daily reality into a dark and frightening dream world, leaves a stream of surreal images and ideas in the visual memory and the mind.

General

Imprint:	Faber and Faber
Country of origin:	United Kingdom
Release date:	April 2002
Authors:	Andrzej Klimowski
Dimensions:	216 x 135 x 21mm (L x W x T)
Format:	Paperback
Pages:	296
Edition:	Main
ISBN-13:	978-0-571-20688-9
Categories:	Books > Fiction > Special features > Graphic novels
LSN:	0-571-20688-3
Barcode:	9780571206889

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