Alas, the weekend is upon us again, and with the week I've had, I'd like little more than to kick back, relax, and do some pleasure reading.  I may be alone in this feeling, but when I hear the words "pleasure reading", I don't necessarily think of a critically-renowned book, or a classic work of literature; I read enough of that for school, or just when I'm reading on the bus every day.  Honestly, when I think about reading for fun, especially on the weekend, my mind jumps to graphic novels.  For those of you who are unfamiliar with the concept of the "graphic novel" allow me to explain: in layman's terms, a graphic novel is just a big, elaborate comic book. To refine that just a bit more, it is a longer, much more developed story (aka, a novel) that is told with the combination of both pictures and words (hence "graphic") and more often than not is a bit more "mature" than your standard comic book.

I am aware that most of you don't know much about graphic novels, so I thought I'd just give a couple of recommendations and give you a quick synopsis of what they're about.  Hopefully you find something that tickles your fancy....

- Watchmen: Simply put, this is probably the most critically acclaimed graphic novel ever. It's like the War and Peace of graphic novels, but better. In March, a movie adaptation is coming out. It's almost too hard to explain beyond that.

- Batman: The Long Halloween: I am a Batman fanatic. I own about forty Batman graphic novels (read: almost every one ever released) and this is hands down the best of them. It's drawn beautifully, written better than most major novels, and is so suspenseful that you'll want to do nothing until you finish this book. It encompasses nearly every Batman villain as Batman tries to find a killer known only as "Holiday". But that's all I'll give away....

- Ghost World: Chances are, you might know the movie. The comic is better. The style is markedly more "graphic novel" than comic: it is all black and white with blue tones. There is nothing super-hero or special powers-related in this book, it's just life and the peculiarities that make it so, especially for the teenage girl who is the protagonist of the story.

- Sleepwalk: It's realistic and somewhat of a downer, but this beautifully-drawn black and white collection examines the delicate details of what happens behind closed doors, when people are alone. The characters are highly realistic, flawed people struggling to connect with one another. I agree, it sounds bleak, but there are moments in there that are simply transcendental for their narrative beauty.

- The Left Bank Gang: The author, Jason, takes expatriate Paris in the 1920s, examines the collection of literary giants that were living there at the time (folks like Hemingway, Fitzgerald, James Joyce, Ezra Pound, and Gertrude Stein) and anthropomorphizes them into animals. The characters examine life and discuss literature; they also decide to rob a bank, which gives the book a somewhat absurd turn. It sounds crazy, it kind of is, but it's crazy served up just the way I like it.

Have a great weekend, hopefully you find a book (graphic or text, your choice) and enjoy a little relaxing page turning before heading back to work on Monday; I know I will!