Hergé: The Case of Tournesol

One evening, something strange begins to happen in Mulensar - for no apparent reason, window glass, mirrors, vases, chandeliers burst and fly into small pieces in the house... Trying to understand what’s going on, Tintin notices that all the episodes with exploding glass occur when Tournesol is in his laboratory. And it’s true: as soon as the professor left for Geneva for the congress on nuclear physics, everything immediately stopped! Well, the boxes full of broken glass found in Tournesol’s laboratory only confirmed this guess. Worse still: after a visit to the laboratory, it becomes obvious to Tintin and Captain Haddock that someone is very interested in their friend's scientific developments. Wasting no time, they fly to Geneva to warn the professor about the danger...
Publication of the 18th volume of The Adventures of Tintin began in December 1954 in Tintin magazine and continued for more than a year, until February 1956. The growth of international tension could not help but affect the thoughts and moods of the author, so the appearance of a spy theme in the plot seems quite natural: it is not without reason that many critics call “The Tournesol Case” the most cinematic album in the series. However, Hergé in no way set himself the task of creating a spy thriller, so he filled the next volume with a fair amount of humor. Oddly enough, this particular volume, which is perhaps the most intense volume in the series in terms of plot, also became one of the funniest: the book is literally replete with gags, both visual and textual. Interesting fact: “The Case of Tournesol” is one of the few Tintin adventures in which the hero does not leave continental Europe.

Author: Hergé

Translation: Mikhail Khachaturov

Pages: 64 (offset). Hardcover

Dimensions: 290×217×10 mm