Saturday, March 2, 2013

HOUSE OF HUNGER

In 2011, me and my wife Loka Kanarp made a graphic novel called Hungerhuset, published by Kolik förlag in Sweden in the autumn, and in January 2012 in translation by the french Actes Sud.

The french magazine Le Monde put it as number one on their list of "Les choix culture". They write, among other things:

‎"You don't have to be a fan of scandinavian literature or film to be seduced by the poisonous charm of this graphic novel in duochrome, where imagination is mixed with psychological tension. As a metaphor of forest and shadow, this voracious house tells us with strong emotion of the childish anguish in the face of loss and emptiness."Read the whole review on Le Monde

Here are some translated excerpts from the swedish reviews of Hungerhuset:

”The low-key, taciturn text carry the dramatic story, and it is remarkable to see the pace that Kanarp’s attenuated, clearly contured drawings manage to produce. The force in Kanarp’s and Edenborg’s book, perhaps the best comic book this year, is that the authors rely on the genre’s – the horror story, the comic – ability to express a psychological content beyond and woven into the fast-paced story." (Jonas Ellerström, SMP)

”From time to time, I forget I’m reading a comic book, because it has the feeling of a movie. / It’s a well narrated story in text as well as in images. It’s an exciting, scary and creepy tale that works very well in this format.” (Anna Jonsson, Bokcirklar)

”Hungerhuset is a very atmospheric horror story, told in beautiful, stringent, clean pictures. In the same way that the house conceals something dark and evil, there are both darkness and sorrow beyond what at the surface can seem like a simple plot and charming pictures.” (Spektakulärt)

”The book isn’t only beautiful and pretty drawed, it’s vital and sparkling in its literary design, the people we meet are made of flesh and blood. Buy the most beautiful book cover this year and get a ghost story worth its name at the same time.” (Staffars serieblogg)

”The result is both an effective ghost story and a sensitively narrated tale about the sorrow of two girls after their mother’s death.” (Simon säger)

”Hungerhuset is a handsomely and cleanly drawn, creepy, exciting and easy-read horror story.” (Gummistövlar)