Award-winning Quebecois cartoonist Pascal Blanchet’s graphic novel is a compelling account of the rise and fall of a small town in northern Quebec. In the first English translation of his work, Blanchet seamlessly blends fact and fiction as he weaves together the official history of the town of White Rapids and snapshots of the quotidian life of its residents. Founded in 1928 in an isolated region of Quebec forest, the town was conceived and constructed by the Shawinigan Water & Power Company to function as a fully equipped, self-contained community for workers at the nearby dam. Intended to lure employees and their families to the remote region, White Rapids provided its residents with all the luxuries of middle-class life in a pastoral setting–until the town was abruptly shut down in 1971, when the company changed hands. Blanchet’s streamlined, retro-inspired aesthetic draws on art deco and fifties modernist design to vividly conjure idyllic scenes of lazy summer days and crisp winter nights, transporting the reader back to a more innocent time.
