Both a rip-roaring adventure series set in pre-World War I Paris and a parody of same, Ad?le Blanc-Sec has been enchanting, thrilling, and puzzling readers worldwide through four decades.

With various American attempts to publish Ad?le having dribbled into nothing decades ago, Fantagraphics Books, fresh from its triumphs with Tardi's West Coast Blues and You Are There, launches a spectacular, newly re-translated, hardcover series that intends to collect every one of its nine (soon ten) volumes. In this premiere installment, Ad?le becomes involved in an interlocking series of mysteries that involve a revived pterodactyl, a frightful on-stage murder, a looming execution by guillotine, and a demon from the depths of hell — plus of course moronic gendarmes, loyal (or perhaps traitorous?) henchmen, and a climax atop the Eiffel Tower.

The Ad?le Blanc-Sec series is currently being adapted into a series of films by the renowned action director Luc Besson (The Professional, The Fifth Element), bringing this quirky, very French series to a new worldwide audience.