The Jellyfish King

The author of Panther and The City of Belgium returns with another unconventional coming of age story.

A child is born and slowly opens his eyes to a cruel world. His mother is dead and his father has retreated into himself. Seeking the approval of his father, the child begins to draw: to create, to document what he sees. This awakens his father from his grief and he begins to educate his child in the ways of the world. Our hero is educated in the arts and sciences and survival skills and is taught to beware of the outside sinister forces at play behind everything. Every pattern is a code, every acquaintance a betrayer waiting to be exposed.

Brecht Evens returns with a lucid detailed shining bildungsroman that looks deep into the heart of generational trauma, miseducation, and conspiracy-minded thinking. Page after page of complicated brilliant tableaus mixing symbols modern and ancient unfold revealing an ever complex and sinister world. Evens is a master at mixing humour and horror in what will surely be the year’s most gorgeous and transfixing graphic novel.

Translated by François Vigneault and Brecht Evens