Over on the FLOG blog, Fantagraphics are offering up a preview of The Arctic Marauder, a reprint of one of Jacques Tardi’s earliest and most distinctive graphic novels.

From the preview, the book looks pretty damn fantastic! I’m a real sucker for a steampunk story, and this looks right up my alley!

Solicitation:

The Arctic Marauder

by Jacques Tardi

64-page black & white 9″ x 11.75″ hardcover • $16.99
ISBN: 978-1-60699-435-1

Ships in: March 2011 (subject to change) — Pre-Order Now

In our ongoing quest to showcase the wide range of Jacques Tardi’s bibliography, Fantagraphics reaches all the way back to one of his earliest, and most distinctive graphic novels: A satirical, Jules Verne-esque “retro-sci-fi” yarn executed on scratchboard in a stunningly detailed faux-woodcut style perfectly chosen to render the Edwardian-era mechanical marvels on display. Created in 1972, The Arctic Marauder is a downright prescient example of proto-“steampunk” science fiction — or perhaps more accurately, and to coin a spinoff genre, “icepunk.”

In 1899, “L’Anjou,” a ship navigating the Arctic Ocean from Murmansk, Russia, to Le Havre, France comes across a stunning sight: A ghostly, abandoned vessel perched high atop an iceberg. But exploring this strange apparition is the last thing the sailors will ever do, as their own ship is soon dispatched to Davy Jones’ locker via a mysterious explosion.

Enter Jérôme Plumier, whose search for his missing uncle, the inventor Louis-Ferdinand Chapoutier, brings him into contact with the sinister, frigid forces behind this — and soon he too is headed towards the North Pole, where he will contend with mad scientists, monsters of the deep, and futuristic submarines and flying machines.

Told with brio in hilarious slabs of vintage purple prose, The Arctic Marauder works both as ripping good adventure story and parody of same, and, predating as it does the later and not dissimilar Adèle Blanc-Sec series, is a keystone in Tardi’s oeuvre in his fantastical mode.

Click here to see the 7-page preview, and to see a video preview of the book, head to http://www.flickr.com/photos/fantagraphics/sets/72157625782911611/show/

Related posts:

1. Fantagraphics 2010 Preview Exhibition Opens on January 9th
2. Cyber Monday: Fantagraphics Offers 30% Off Over 75 Items in Their Online Store!
3. An Evening with Johnny Ryan at Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery - Saturday October 10th
4. Party with Gilbert Hernandez at Fantagraphics Bookstore this Saturday, March 13!
5. Jim Woodring Presents Weathercraft at Fantagraphics