The Plan B Books Graphic Novel Book Group

I've been banging on about Plan B Books a fair bit recently. It's a nice shop, a world away from Forbidden Planet. Not that there is anything wrong with Forbidden
Planet but it doesn't really cater to all tastes.

Plan B mainly deal with the artistic and intellectual side of comic books. They don't carry much in the way of superhero comics because Forbidden Planet covers that. Plan B also promote intelligent comics through events like their recent Bryan Talbot signing/talk and tonight's inaugural Graphic Novel Book Group.

The first book chosen for the Book Group was Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi. Luckily I already owned a copy of the book and I think I read it years ago but I couldn't really remember. I have seen the film in the past couple of years. I started to read the book at about 6PM tonight and gave wikipedia a cursory scan to make sure that I hadn't missed any important plot points.

The venue was Mono, a favourite hangout of mine. About 20 people came along which was probably more than the organiser bloke expected. I had never been to a book group before so I didn't really know what to expect. Everyone had brought a copy of the book with them (apparently this is traditional at book groups).

Persepolis was a good book to start with. It's an easily accessible autobiographical story detailing the childhood and maturation of the author in the revolutionary Iran of the late '70s and early '80s. The book is clearly drawn and covers a lot of Iranian history in a clear and concise manner.

Generally, the Book Group liked the book. There was some discussion about the simplistic nature of the artwork and the fact that Satrapi is not a 'master' of the graphic novel. 'Mastery' of the comic book form is probably a highly subjective concept. The conversation also touched upon the political situation in Iran and the grammar of comic books.

I enjoyed the evening and I met a few interesting people. It was good to have some intelligent conversations about comic books. Several people at the meeting turned out to be prospective comic book creators and it was nice to hear about their approach to the medium. I always wanted to write comic books (i.e. be Alan Moore) when I was a kid and it was great to meet like minded souls. I don't know if I could find the time to write a comic book because doctoring/neurology training/thesis writing takes up most of my life but it could be a good thing to do at some point.

Hopefully I'll be able to make future meetings.