Tough question. I would have to go the the somewhat obscure "Conan the Reaver", a late 80's/early 90's GN with art by the always splendid John Severin. While there may be other books with greater significance or literary merit, this book always brings a smile to my face.

Wtf are you all talking about. A novel doesn't have graphics.

Kurt Vonnegut, Ursula le Guin and others beg to differ.

So does Harlan Ellison, who once wrote an illustrated novella with Frank Miller.

And if you piss off Harlan Ellison, he'll grope your man-boobs. Don't do it!

You forgot Tembermain Charlemagne! Which makes it three!

Gaudy picture books aren't literature and will never be, term it all you want.

If were talking about orginal graphic novels, then I would have to say Alex Robinson's Tricked (although Box Office Poison was great too).

Also Michelle Tea and Laurenn McCubbin did this really great book called Rent Girl. It's more of an illustrated novel (One panel every other page and tons of text), but it is great. Very adult themed, but great....

Here's a link....

http://www.amazon.com/Rent-Girl-Michelle...ie=UTF8&s=books

Batman: The Killing Joke.

Maybe because it was the first GN I ever bought (I was 12 or 13 years old at the time) but mainly because it was by Alan Moore and Brian Bolland, two of my favourite creators.

My personal favorite is "Watchmen". I seem to find something new that enriches the background of the story every time I read it. My paperback copy is looking rather sad nowadays. It's by no means a "perfect" story (whatever "perfect" means), but it is entertaining, informative, sometimes shocking, and contains characters very similar to Charlton characters that I remember from younger days (and of course, I know now that's no coincidence, but I figured it out before it was known by the other "fans" around me, who thought I was nuts to see ANY RESEMBLANCE WHATSOEVER between Alan Moore's characters and Charlton's "sad, sorry excuses for super-heroes".)

I don't know if they count as a graphic novels, but I also enjoy "Superman: Peace on Earth", and "Batman: War on Crime" (and the WW and CM ones as well). Beautifully done!

One of my favs was KING DAVID by Kyle Baker. His play on the harsh realities of war, sex, and politics in the Bible was great. He also acurately portrayed the Jews and Philistines according to geographic logic. I enjoyed this. I also liked Birth of A NATION with Baker, McGruder, and Hudlin. That's Classic. Kingdom Come remains great in it's own right, though I have issues with Ross's humour intended (I guess) display of the Fat Albert Crew depicted as thugs running from Batman's Robot sentinels. We (the readers) are to believe they are simply common thugs. If this criminalization were done to the sacred heroes of suburban Americana like say 'Beaver'(leave it to...) or a thug image of the false, yet commonly still used image of a white (pantene plus haired) Jesus...!= there'd be an immediate uproar.
Ross is very Americana and there lies his faults to me. How many characters (batman, Superman, Shazam) does he model off of his one buddy? His models tend to lack diversity, even with the main woman hero depictions. Still I respect his general skill, especially in Kingdom Come. The book is yet a classic.

my perspective....


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Eisner's A Contract With God is the one that I'll always remember, the one that opened my eyes to the wider possibilities of the form.

Jodorowsky and Moebius' The Incal trilogy probably deserves to be on the list of greatest SOMETHINGs, if not "graphic novels" then maybe "sci-fi comics series."

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There are a lot of comics series that get collected as "graphic novels" later, but I find myself looking for the issue breaks, even when they've been edited out of the collected volumes. Even when they were never really obvious, like in Cerebus, I find myself looking for those breaks, and it pulls me out of the ongoing narrative. I don't know if that serial quality invalidates a work as a graphic novel, or if it's just my own personal hangup that I should try to ignore. Anyone else have this problem?