Lucas Harari

An NPR Best Book of the Year Pierre is a young man at a crossroads. He drops out of architecture school and decides to travel to Vals in the Swiss Alps, home to a thermal springs complex located deep inside a mountain. The complex, designed by architect Peter Zumthor, had been the subject of Pierre’s thesis. The mountain holds many mysteries; it was said to have a mouth that periodically swallowed people up. Pierre, sketchbook in hand, is drawn to the enigmatic powers of the mountain and its springs, and attempts to uncover the truth behind them in the secret rooms he discovers deep within the complex. But he finds his match in a man named Valeret who is similarly obsessed, and who’d like nothing more than to eliminate his competitor. Gorgeously illustrated, Swimming in Darkness is an intriguing, noirish graphic novel about uncovering the powerful secrets of the natural world.

Léo, jeune rêveur parisien caressant l'espoir de devenir écrivain, bosse dans un lavomatique en attendant de trouver l'inspiration pour son grand œuvre. Un jour, le destin vient lui donner un coup de pouce sous la forme de son riche cousin, qui lui propose de garder sa maison de vacances : effaré mais content, le timide Léo se retrouve voisin de riches plaisanciers aux voitures de collections et villas d'architectes où le champagne coule à flot. Dans cette atmosphère aussi légère que surréaliste, cependant, quelque chose cloche. Des corps de jeunes gens sont retrouvés l'un après l'autre aux alentours et une étrange tension monte... Bientôt, il devient clair qu'un assassin pervers sévit tout près. C'est dans ce cadre étrange que Léo rencontre sa voisine, adolescente capricieuse et sauvage : la belle Rose..