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    Graphic Novels

    First off, I'd like to apologise to those that are fans of graphic novels. For years I have considered them weird and nerdish. However, last week I read my first graphic novel, Persepolis. I loved it and will read the sequel over the weekend.

    I'm looking for recommendations. I wouldn't be too keen on superheroes - watching them on the big screen is enough for me. Other than that I'm pretty open minded. Bonus for those that could be found in a library.

    #2
    Graphic Novels

    Damn!

    I'd best be brief before Ginger Yellow gets here!

    Basically, a mate of mine used to work in a comic book shop for years and would recommend me things. Amongst those I enjoyed the most were:

    'Elektra: Assassin' by Frank miller and Bill Sienkiewicz

    'Blood - A Tale' by J.M. DeMatteis and Kent Williams

    'Ed The Happy Clown' by Chester Brown

    'Dracula - A Symphony in Moonlight and Nightmares' by Jon J. Muth

    'Marshall Law: Fear & Loathing' by Pat Mills and Kevin O'Neill

    'Black Orchid' by Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean

    'Meltdown' by Walter & Louise Simonson and Jon J. Muth

    ...and loads of others I've forgotten at the moment.

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      #3
      Graphic Novels

      Heh!

      I deliberately left those three alone, so someone else could cover them and CV did so admirably.

      Yeah, it's impossible to avoid superheroes, I'm afraid, but from my suggestions 'Blood','Ed the Happy Clown' and 'Dracula...' are the ones that do just that. 'Ed the Happy Clown' is also the funniest thing of any kind I have ever read.

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        #4
        Graphic Novels

        I forgot to mention my favourite Batman novel: 'Arkham Asylum' by Grant Morrison and Dave McKean. That explores Batman's rather twisted sadomasochistic psyche.

        For a while, Sienkiewicz, McKean, Muth, Williams, O'Neill and Steve Yeowell just ruled the graphic novels illustration world. It was always the artwork I was more interested in, really. Sienkiewicz did an excellent illustrated (though precis-ed) version of 'Moby Dick' too.

        Edit: Actually, what I think I'll do is start up a separate thread on here dedicated to graphic novel artwork. That way, this discussion thread won't get swamped with images, hopefully. They do deserve a thread of their own, though.

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          #5
          Graphic Novels

          From a quick look of my library's online catalogue they seem to have quite a few by Gaiman and Miller but not the ones recommended. Doesn't seem to have Watchmen either but has 3 or 4 of Alan Moore's work. It has Maus - I'll look out for that tomorrow.

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            #6
            Graphic Novels

            I think you could easily read dozens of fantastic graphic novels without ever having deal with superheroes, nils.

            However, there are many good suggestions - both superhero and non-superhero - made by evilC and CV. Just like best albums, there is a proliferation of lists of the 'best graphic novels ever' so you wouldn't be going wrong if you perused a few of these online and then went down to your local library and see what they had. Most local libraries have a pretty decent selection now. (And of course, borrowing then beats buying them, as graphic novels are notoriously quick to read and thus often not worth purchasing them unless you're a real fan or particularly like the artwork).

            To add a couple more suggestions - Will Eisner was considered by many to be the father of the graphic novel form and his work of the 70s and 80s is definitely worth a look. He often bases them in and around the immigrant communities of New York.

            Black Hole by Charles Burns is a great favourite of mine. Somone on the old board recommended it and it really was a fantastic read. Set in Seattle in the 1970s, it deals with a plague that takes over the town's teenagers.

            http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_graphic_novels:_Award-winning

            Just found the above list which is good as it lists the graphic novels which actually won awards. However, there are many more lists like this so dive in and enjoy!

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              #7
              Graphic Novels

              A little head up for a rather serious graphic novel from a chap from Geneva which won critical acclaim in the French speaking word and has now been translated into English, The Observer reviewer seems quite impressed...Of what I read in a French mag, there is quite a good little scene in French speaking Switzerland although very little of that superhero business.

              http://books.guardian.co.uk/intervie...267473,00.html

              Comment


                #8
                Graphic Novels

                And this list has some interesting pointers. I read a bit of "L'autoroute du soleil", a manga style road "movie" by a rather well known French cartoonist, it's very good.

                http://www.indyworld.com/indy/summer...gns/index.html

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                  #9
                  Graphic Novels

                  Here's the thing though. I find it quite irksome having to talk about graphic novels when really, 9 times out of 10 we're talking about comics.

                  Let's call a spade a spade for god's sake.

                  However, I do realise that many people are put off by the term comics and whoever coined the term 'graphic novel' should be given an award as some sort of a marketing genius as they are now reaching parts of public libraries, Waterstones and the broadsheets that the word 'comics' just couldn’t get to.

                  I’ll leave the last word to Neil Gaiman on this, in an interview from 1999:

                  “When I was in England four years ago I was at a literary party. It was one of these Christmas parties that magazines throw. I was invited and I went along and I got talking to a guy who turned out to be the literary editor of the Sunday Telegraph. He asked what I did. When I answered that I write comic books, he looked at me as if I had confessed to shoplifting or something. So we're standing there having a drink and he's looking uncomfortable, but before I can walk away he asked what kind of comic books I write. When I answered they were the Sandman series, he looks at me, says, "Hang on, I know you, you're Neil Gaiman. My dear fellow, you don't write comics, you write graphic novels."
                  So as far as I can tell, it's just a difference between being a hooker and a lady of the evening. Basically. The nice thing about calling them graphic novels is that people who can't quite cope with comic books can cope with them under the term "graphic novels.”

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                    #10
                    Graphic Novels

                    Same thing with sci-fi Jon, you better call it "speculative fiction" or "dystopian future novel" otherwise, that's it...

                    Comment


                      #11
                      Graphic Novels

                      You'll probably want to read this thread at Comics Should Be Good on recommending non-superhero comics for a few pointers.

                      Besides the ones already mentioned, I thought I'd name a few to show you the range of the medium.

                      Joe Sacco's books, (you might want to start with Safe Area Gorazde or Palestine) use a comic form to do narrative, first person journalism. There are similarities to Spiegelman, but it's more outward looking.

                      Alice in Sunderland uses a dazzling array of aesthetics to talk about history and culture.

                      The Arrival tells an immigrant's tale with no words whatsoever.

                      Y: The Last Man, which has just finished its run, is a clasic (non-superhero) sci-fi dystopian future. Inidentally, you can't really go wrong with anything else written by Brian K Vaughan either.

                      If you do end up wanting to delve into superhero stuff (and I understand your reluctance) there's a wealth of well written stories that could possibly best be described as "revisionist", in the manner of Watchmen. Most obvious is Miller's Batman work, but there's also Bendis's Powers, a detective story where the perps and victims happen to have superpowers, and arguably Astonishing X-Men by Joss Whedon, which is X-Men like you've never seen it before.

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                        #12
                        Graphic Novels

                        Doesn't the disctinction between comics and graphic novels denote whether an ongoing series or a self-contained work is being referred to? Or is it just a case of "graphic novel" sounding posher (despite the fact that "novel" was once a dismissive term for serialised "amusements" ).

                        I'm not a comics/graphic novels person at all, but I finished Watchmen yesterday and From Hell a couple of weeks ago (they were the first things that caught my eye when I joined the library last month). Give those a go, Nil: Alan Moore's a fantastic writer who happens to make the most of a medium halfway between fiction and film. He's got a very mature sense of drama: his characters are complex - never 100% sympathetic or villainous - and always compelling.



                        Watchmen is a great read, and I can see why it was such a big deal when it came out. The crux of it is roughly: life is very, very complicated; how would a set of people who actually dress up and act as vigilantes really fare? They're placed very explicitly in the changing political context from WW2 to the mid-80s under the shadow of nuclear war. The artwork seems deliberately garish in the mould of your proper old superhero comics, which, paradoxically, emphasises the 'realistic' aspects even more.

                        I'd be interested to know how it was produced at the time. I got the impression that Moore might have been making it up as he went along, to some extent, as each issue came out: there seemed to be plenty of different directions he could have taken it, different characters he could have explored in more depth. The only element that fell slightly flat for me was the splicing of the pirate comic narrative with the present-day NY dystopia, just cause the former was a bit dull and not pertinent to present events beyond being about dire circumstances; but overall it's as good as everyone says.



                        The superhero-free From Hell ranks alongside my favourite novels and films ever, though. It's a staggering piece of work: integral to the facinating, always surprising plot are some great observations on gender politics, architecture, class, empire, sexuality, myth, William Blake, the media, justice, Freemasonry, the royal family's suspected mafia-style tactics . . . it's just an incredible piece of work. I heard it took 10 years to research and write, and I can well believe it.

                        In the appendices (if you'll pardon the term in relation to a book about a murderer who gutted his victims), Moore emerges as a sterling guy. Having only seen pictures of him with his doom-metal beard, and having the impression he was vaguely into magic or some shit, I'd assumed he might be an accidentally brilliant crank; but he's totally got his head screwed on, and has a great critical distance from all the crackpots and absurdities in the Jack The Ripper industry. He didn't want to touch the story with a bargepole originally.

                        I don't even want to think about how the films of those two have or will come out. I bet they're real stinkers.

                        Comment


                          #13
                          Graphic Novels

                          Oh yeah: I've not read it for about ten years, but I'm pretty sure Peter Milligan's The Enigma will blow your tits off. If we're keeping up the clanky comparisons, Moore would be Shakespeare, Frank Miller Marlowe, and Milligan roughly James Joyce crossed with Albert Camus and Taylor Parkes, having a late-20s crisis in Shitsville USA. There are superheroes and villains, but they're kind of psychosexual projections so it's easier to swallow.

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                            #14
                            Graphic Novels

                            "Doesn't the disctinction between comics and graphic novels denote whether an ongoing series or a self-contained work is being referred to? Or is it just a case of "graphic novel" sounding posher (despite the fact that "novel" was once a dismissive term for serialised "amusements" )."


                            Well, to me the distinction is whether or not the work is initially published in comic form or not. Most of the works discussed on this very thread (certainly the English language ones) came out as serialised comics first.

                            Eg, From Hell, Watchmen, Black Hole, Sandman, Maus. I could go on.

                            This is because sequential art in the English language has come from a tradition of serialised comic books. No doubt Art Speigleman, Alan Moore etc would prefer to have had their work published directly as a graphic novel and not have to go through a comic book serialisation process first.

                            Things are changing slowly now. Bryan Talbot fought long and hard to get Alice in Sunderland (mentioned by GY above) printed as a standalone graphic novel. Not only that, he made sure his publisher (Jonathan Cape) was an established mainstream one, making sure his work didn't simply languish in 'comic shop ghetto land.' (Interestingly, he didn't succeed in the US and had to make do with Dark Horse a comic-book publishing company).

                            Lots of great stuff from many people on this thread. And lots of stuff for me to check out, once I ween myself off my super-hero obsession. I'm trying, I really am. But I'm currently on a big Superman kick at the moment.

                            Comment


                              #15
                              Graphic Novels

                              My local library is being refurbished at the moment so they only had a very limited selection to choose from in the mobile library they have providing the stopgap service. I know I said I wasn't interested in superheros but when I saw the greatest superhero of all time I couldn't resist. That's right, ladies and gentlemen I borrowed The Adventures of TinTin.

                              Thanks for the tips all - I'll be browsing the library when it reopens in May with new stock.

                              Comment


                                #16
                                Graphic Novels

                                I bit the bullet and read Marvel Zombies over the weekend. It was better than I'd expected, after a bit of a rocky start (it took me a while to get over the very un-canonical zombies), but I still prefer The Walking Dead by a considerable margin. Like I said on the other thread, I'm just not a Marvel person, or even a superhero person for the most part, so characters outside the X-Men, Hulk and Spiderman have no resonance for me.

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                                  #17
                                  Graphic Novels

                                  CV - yes, I've read For Tomorrow and, although it started well enough, I got slightly bored in the middle and just didn't care by the end. Azarello's 100 Bullets is great but his work on both Batman and Superman hasn't impressed me.

                                  I agree with you about Alan Moore though. I wasn't sure whether to include his name in my original post, I just wanted to highlight he fact that some creators want to be seen as graphic novelists, rather than comic book writers.

                                  It's an interesting opinion given by Alan Moore. Both he and I were brought up reading comics rather than graphic novels and therefore one tends to try to find a validity in the format. However, there's no doubting that trade paperbacks/graphic novels are the way forward in terms of sales, it's just that I prefer the term 'comics'.

                                  Comment


                                    #18
                                    Graphic Novels

                                    Apart from 2000AD, I never read comics as a kid, and I only started reading monthlies a year or two ago. So Most of my collection is in TPB form. But I still find the comic/graphic novel debate silly. It's just semantics, and not in an interesting way.

                                    I think comics are in a similar situation to video games, in that the current generation of critics and politicians and managers and so on think that they're "just for kids" and not very sophisticated, but the generation that consumes them as adults a) considers them part of the cultural landscape, b) realises they have much more to offer, and c) is about to take over those same positions. There's going to be a huge shift in mainstream understanding of games and comics in the next decade or two. I think comics have pretty much got there in the UK. The LRB ran Spiegelman's In The Shadow Of No Towers, you regularly read reviews of Clowes or Moore works in broadsheets, and most bookshops have sizeable sections dedicated to comics. Maybe it's because there are so many great British writers, or maybe it's because we didn't have the stigma of the Comics Code hanging over us, but there seems to be much less snobbery about comics in the UK.

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                                      #19
                                      Graphic Novels

                                      The thing I wasn’t happy about with For Tomorrow is the fact that it wanted to make Superman a darker, more brooding character, which he plainly isn’t. All those confessions to the New York priest reminded me of something Daredevil would do, not Superman.

                                      Maybe that’s the reason you liked it, CV, because it is a very UnSupermanlike story. I prefer stories that really work from within the Superman mythos. I said on the other thread I liked All-Star Superman for that reason. I’d add Superman Confidential too by Darwyn Cooke, who is shaping up to be a really good writer.

                                      By the way, I saw a great episode of the Simpsons today, where another comic shop opens over the road from the Android’s Dungeon and they get in Alan Moore, Art Speigelman and Daniel Clowes to do a signing. It’s a pure, unadulterated geek-out for comics fans everywhere.

                                      Comment


                                        #20
                                        Graphic Novels

                                        I'm not a graphic novels guy, but bought and quite enjoyed this after reading a number of favourable reviews. It's a pen and ink travelogue that Thompson created while touring parts of Europe and N. Africa promoting his highly-acclaimed Blankets, which I'm half-way through.

                                        Comment


                                          #21
                                          Graphic Novels

                                          I've had Blankets on my 'to read' pile for months now. let me know what you think of it when you're finished.

                                          Comment


                                            #22
                                            Graphic Novels

                                            I ordered Maus & Watchmen from Amazon last night, so they should turn up on Friday. I'll let you know what I think.

                                            Yhey'll be my first graphic novel since Asterix & the Britons.

                                            Comment


                                              #23
                                              Graphic Novels

                                              The reason that I read books rather than comics is because you just don't know where to start with comics; they're usually half-way through a story, so if you miss the first one, you're buggered.

                                              I saw a great episode of the Simpsons today
                                              I'll be watching that in about five years...

                                              Comment


                                                #24
                                                Graphic Novels

                                                Yes, put me down as a Channel 4 Simpsons watcher too.

                                                However, I was round a friends the other day and he's got the whole of the new series. He said all comics fans should see this episode and it's true - more comic references and guest stars than you can shake a stick at. The only disappointment was it was only half the story - the rest of it was about Marge opening a gym.

                                                Comment


                                                  #25
                                                  Graphic Novels

                                                  I don't even know where to begin with this topic.

                                                  Lately, I've been reading the original Ghost in the Shell manga (in English, of course). I think I prefer the film, but it's pretty good.

                                                  I also really like Darwyn Cooke. Most recently, I read his take on The Spirit.

                                                  I'm currently big on anything drawn by Christopher Mitten. Wasteland is awesome.

                                                  I'm sort of off of Jim Lee. His art is certainly attractive and I like how he draws Gotham City in his Batman work, but to a large extent he's like a lot of those artists that hit big in the early 90s - flashy but lacking in depth. All of his male characters are muscular and dynamic. All of the women look like models/porn stars. After a while, it feels sort of, hmmm, cold, I guess.

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