The Tenderness of Stones

　　在故事的一開始，他們埋葬了父親的一片肺。三個人才能扛起這如巨石般的肺片，人們身著黑衣來此表達哀悼，然而一切並沒有結束──只是開始。

　　身著白衣的人們來到家裡，一次次，將父親身上的某些部分拿走。他們先拆下了他的鼻子，做成繫在頸上的裝飾，再將他的嘴移走，收納在箱子中。後來，父親的另外一片肺也被取出，成為一個行李般，必須隨時拖行走動。而家人一邊面對著所有改變，讓出自己的房間、決定暫緩自己離家獨立的計畫、成為父親的嘴或手腳…一邊理解到在等待他們的，是父親將完全消失的結局。

　　作者Marion Fayolle是法國當代備受注目的創作者，超現實的敘事手法，充滿寓意的符號呈現，將情感張力更濃烈的呈現，描繪家庭的成員，如何面對親人病苦、照護、逝去與哀悼的歷程。捕捉愛、不捨、憤怒、與時而的幽默，在每個讀者心裡掀起共鳴的波瀾。（文/博客來編譯）

　　A surreal and stunningly beautiful graphic novel about death, mourning, and family by one of the most promising young artists working today.

　　“We buried one of dad’s lungs,” announces the narrator of The Tenderness of Stones. The lung is so large it takes three men to carry it—and that is just the beginning. The family looks on as, under the dispassionate orders of anonymous white-clad strangers, their father is disassembled, piece by piece: His nose is removed from his face and tied, temporarily, to his neck; his other lung is pulled out and he is forced to lug it around in a cart; his mouth is pried off and stored away, leaving him mute. Beneath it all is one devastating truth: Soon, he will be gone entirely.

　　Marion Fayolle is one of the most innovative young artists in contemporary comics, and in this startling, gorgeously drawn fable she offers a vision of family illness and grief that is by turns playful and profound, literal and lyrical. She captures the strange swirl of love, resentment, grief, and humor that comes as we watch a loved one transformed before our eyes, and learn to live without them.

Review

　　“Fayolle’s picture book panels teem with emotive hatching and cross-hatching, and wordless sequences swell with pathos, perched over cursive lettering by Dean Sudarsky, much like an illustrated, fantastical diary. Fayolle’s visual storytelling makes a profound statement about how people attempt to understand and respond to the process of watching a loved one being eroded and to accepting their mortality.” —Publishers Weekly

Author

Marion Fayolle

　　Marion Fayolle grew up in the Ardèche region of France and graduated from the Strasbourg School of Decorative Arts in 2011. While at school, she founded the comics and illustration magazine Nyctalope with Matthias Malingrey and Simon Roussin. She is the author of six books, including In Pieces (published in English in 2013), Les amours suspendues, and The Tenderness of Stones. She has also made illustrations for various publications, including The New York Times. She lives in France.

Geoffrey Brock

　　Geoffrey Brock is the author of two collections of poems, the editor of The FSG Book of Twentieth-Century Italian Poetry, and the translator of books by Umberto Eco, Italo Calvino, Roberto Calasso, and others. His translation of Pinocchio appears in both the NYRB Classics series and the New York Review Children’s Collection. He teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing & Translation at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville.