Tongues, Vol. 1

From the three-time Igantz award-winning artist and author of Big Questions comes a fascinating graphic novel retelling of the Greek myth of Prometheus.

“An extraordinary reinvention of some of our oldest stories. Nilsen brings these old gods to an electrifying new life, and gives us a new sense of humanity as well.”—Alexander Chee, author of How to Write an Autobiographical Novel

“Mind-bendingly good. It’s up there with Maus, Fun Home, Persepolis, Jimmy Corrigan.” —Mark Haddon, author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

Set in a version of modern Central Asia, Tongues is a retelling of the Greek myth of Prometheus. It follows the captive god’s friendship with the eagle who carries out his daily sentence of torture and chronicles his pursuit of revenge on the god that has imprisoned him.

Prometheus’s story is entwined with that of an East African orphan on an errand of murder, and a young man with a teddy bear strapped to his back, wandering aimlessly into catastrophe (a character readers may recognize from Nilsen’s Dogs and Water). The story is set against the backdrop of tensions between rival groups in an oil-rich wilderness.

Tongues is both an adventure story and a meditation on human nature in our present fraught, historical moment.