LeBone Orchard Mythosis a collection of linked horror stories, published by Dark Horse since 2022 by Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino.It is neither a continuous series nor a saga to be read in order: each volume is autonomous, and they share a universe rather than a plot.Start withTen Thousand Black FeathersouThe Passageway, the two most readable doors.
A collection of linked horror stories, not a series.This is the first thing to understand, and it's what confuses buyers the most.
LeBone Orchard Mythosis the most recent and least documented project of the Lemire-Sorrentino duo. Its unusual editorial structure – autonomous volumes without common numbering – makes the whole difficult to understand and even more difficult to collect. This article explains what it contains, how to get into it, and why it poses a particular cataloging problem.
What a “mythos” is
The word is borrowed from the tradition of cosmic horror, where it designates a body of stories sharing a mythology without narrative continuity. Different authors, different eras, unrelated characters — but the same entities in the background, the same places that recur, the same logic of the world.
Lemire and Sorrentino apply the principle to their own production. Each volume ofBone Orchardtells a complete story, with its characters and its resolution. What circulates from one book to another are motifs: an orchard of bones, a house that is not where it should be, creatures that are never explained.
This structure has a real advantage for the reader: no entry point is bad. It has an equally real disadvantage for the buyer: nothing indicates, in the store, that a volume belongs to the set.
The main volumes
The Passageway
A geologist is sent to an isolated island to study a passage discovered under the rock. The lighthouse keeper who welcomes him doesn't say everything. Short, contained, very close to the classic horror story - it is the easiest volume of the set to access.
Ten Thousand Black Feathers
Two childhood friends linked by a shared dream meet again years later. The most moving volume of the corpus, and the one that most resembles the intimate Lemire under a layer of horror.
Tenement
A building and its inhabitants, in a choral story where architecture becomes the subject. Sorrentino pushes his work on impossible spaces further than inGideon Falls.
The other stories
The set continues to expand with new volumes and short stories. None requires the reading of the preceding ones, and none definitively concludes the corpus.
Where to enter
Since no order is imposed, the choice depends on what you are looking for.
Ten Thousand Black Feathersif you come from the intimate work of Lemire. This is the volume where horror serves a tale of friendship and loss, and the one that most closely resembles what he writes elsewhere. The best bridge sinceEssex CountyouRoyal City.
The Passagewayif you're looking for pure horror. Short format, behind closed doors, island atmosphere. It is also the least demanding in reading time, therefore the best test before investing in the rest.
Tenementif it's Sorrentino's graphic work that interests you. This is where he goes furthest in the deconstruction of space, at the risk of difficult readability.
Avoid starting with a short story published in isolation: without context, they give the impression of a fragment which does not do justice to the whole.
What the mythos shares withGideon Falls
A place that doesn't stand up
The black barn ofGideon Fallshad the function of existing in the wrong place. The mythos takes this principle and declines it: a passage under an island, a building whose floors do not correspond.
The lack of explanation
Nothing is ever fully elucidated. It is a convention of the genre, and the assumed refusal of the final revelation which would defuse fear.
Trauma as a door
Characters who encounter the anomaly always have a previous wound — grief, addiction, illness. The supernatural is never the cause, and never the metaphor either.
The page as an instrument
Exploded compositions, double pages with two meanings, grids that fall apart. The duo's formal vocabulary is intact, sometimes pushed further than before.
The orchard of bones, and what the title announces
The name of the corpus is not decorative. “Bone orchard” is an English slang expression for a cemetery — literally, an orchard of bones. The image says quite well what the duo is making: a place where something grows from what is dead.
The motif recurs from one volume to another in different forms. An island whose subsoil contains something other than rock. A building built on what would be better left undisturbed. Roots, branches, organic structures that proliferate where they should not.
It is also a key to understanding the unity of the corpus, which does not appear when reading a single volume. These stories do not share a plot but the same idea: that the past is not over, that it continues to grow beneath the surface, and that it always ends up rising. The characters who encounter the anomaly are systematically those who have something buried.
A comparison with the rest of Lemire's work is then necessary. The dead brother ofRoyal Citywhich appears at four different ages, the orphanage fire of 1917 which resurfaces inEssex County, the original catastrophe ofGo down— it's the same mechanism, this time treated as explicit horror rather than family drama.
The real problem: collecting a set without numbering
This is the practical point which justifies this article, and it is valid beyond this corpus.
A classic series is easily collected because it carries its own card: the numbers follow one another, a hole is visible. A set like theBone Orchardoffers nothing of the sort. The volumes bear titles with no apparent connection, are not numbered together, and nothing on the cover says that they belong to the same project.
Concretely: a collector who ownsThe PassagewayetTenementhas no way of knowing, on the shelves, if it is missing a title — or how many. Nor can he rely on the publisher's catalog, which classifies these volumes as independent publications.
The only solution is to create the grouping yourself.Saving each volume with a common label — “Bone Orchard” — transforms an invisible set into a collection that can be counted. Without it, the question “what am I missing?” » simply has no answer.
This is the same problem posed by shared universes without numbering, anthologies by an author, or the works of a duo distributed between several publishers. None of these groupings exist in commercial metadata: they only exist if the collector creates them.
Formats
Each story of the mythos generally exists in two forms: the original publication - short series in soft issues or single volume depending on the case - and a subsequent collection.
Dark Horse has also published editions bringing together several stories from the corpus. These are the most interesting for discovering the whole, but they create the classic duplicate: a reader who already has two separate volumes and buys a grouping ends up with the same stories in duplicate.
Systematically check the list of titles contained on the cover pages before purchasing a combined edition. On a corpus without numbering, this is the only information that allows us to know what we have.
La disponibilité française
This is the practical weak point of this corpus for a French-speaking reader. The volumes ofBone Orcharddid not benefit from the same exposure asGideon Falls, and their publication in French was later and more partial.
Two consequences. First, it is common to find only part of the corpus translated, which requires mixing languages into the same set - uncomfortable, but less serious here than elsewhere since the volumes are autonomous. Then, the French editions being modest, certain titles quickly become rare in new editions.
If you are interested in the corpus and you read English, the original version remains the safest option for bringing everything together. It is also the one which guarantees benefit from grouped editions, less systematically reproduced in French.
Should you have readGideon Falls?
No. There is no continuity between the two, no character or common place. These are two separate horror projects from the same duo.
That said, the most satisfying reading order remainsGideon FallsFirst of all. The series installs the formal vocabulary of the duo in a longer and more explanatory framework; the mythos assumes this acquired vocabulary and goes faster. A reader who discovers Sorrentino throughTenementmay legitimately find reading difficult.
What this project says about their evolution
The transition from a continuous series to a set of autonomous stories is not trivial. It corresponds to an underlying trend among creator-owned authors: moving away from the monthly format, which imposes a rhythm and length, to publish finished objects when they are ready.
For the duo, this means shorter, denser stories, and increased formal freedom — no constraint of a cliffhanger every twenty pages. For the reader, this means books that close, which is relaxing after an extended universe likeBlack Hammer.
For the collector, on the other hand, it is a clear complication. The monthly format at least had the advantage of readability: we knew what we were following, and where we were.
Questions fréquentes
No, none. Each volume tells a complete story with its own characters, and what flows from book to book is pattern rather than plot. You can enter through any one — that’s the very principle of a mythos.
This is not necessary, there is no continuity connecting them. However, it is more comfortable:Gideon Fallsinstalls the duo's graphic vocabulary on a long series, where the mythos supposes it to be acquired and goes faster.
The corpus continues to expand and there is no definitive number, which radically distinguishes this set from a series announced as closed. No common numbering links the volumes, no editorial communication announces a term, and the publisher's catalog classifies them as independent publications. So the only way to know where you stand is to keep your own list and keep it up to date — that's the price of this format, and that's exactly the job a numbered series does for you. This is precisely what makes it difficult to follow: without common numbering or end announcement, the only way to know where you are is to keep your own list.
By systematically checking the list of stories contained in the grouped editions, indicated on the endpapers. A reader who owns two separate volumes and buys a collection ends up with the same stories in duplicate - the case is common on sets without numbering.
Ten Thousand Black Feathersif you come from intimate Lemire,The Passagewayif you're looking for short, contained horror. On the other hand, avoid entering with a short story published in isolation: out of context, they give the impression of a fragment which undermines the whole.
Create groupings that the publisher does not provide
On a corpus without numbering, only a common label allows you to know what is missing.