Pachyderme

A sci-fi tale which has all the echoes of a David Lynch film. Almost cinematic in style, in the breathless opening to this graphic novel we get a traffic jam due to a wounded elephant; a blind pigkeeper; an alien-looking grey baby; a cavalier and alcoholic skirt-chasing surgeon; and a beanpole of a Swiss secret policeman. Our heroine, Carice, walks from her car through the woods, as if in a trance, to a hospital to visit her diplomat husband, indisposed from a car accident. Her goodbye note, which she intends to deliver in person, is in her purse. The hospital is vast, remote, and foreboding, filled with suitable loonies. The book’s first third ends with Carice waking an apparently dead body in the morgue with her whistling. Chopin? the body asks. Carice nods. We learn of her too-early marriage, her dashed dreams as a concert pianist, and in the course of conversation realize that the aged cadaver she’s talking to is her future self.

This cinematic tale opens surrealistically: with a traffic jam caused by a wounded elephant. Our heroine, Carice, abandons her car and walks trancelike through a wood to visit her husband in the hospital. Along the way she meets a few odd characters, including a blind pig keeper and an alien-looking baby. The surreal encounters do not stop there. The hospital is eerie and foreboding. When Carice’s whistling wakes up an apparently dead body in the morgue, she soon realizes that the aged cadaver she’s talking to is her future self.

Praise for Pachyderme:

“Peeters’ tale of self-discovery is enthralling; in the author’s hands, Cold War paranoia and thoughtfully subverted realist art provides commentary on other kinds of secrets, other kinds of betrayals and the conflict between duty and need.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“Peeters’ evocative artwork—inspired equally, it seems, by classic Hollywood and the great horror comics of mid-century—makes every page eye-catching.” —Slate