I bought this book along with others discussing how to create graphic novels.And out of all of them I found this the most useful. This book goes into detail about how to pick your genre, how to develope characters, how to write a plot and many other useful things. This is a great book and belongs in every comic book artist library.

This had the usual "chock fulla" feel in the store but a closer reading indicates the author thinks too highly of his qualifications. The kind of people who latch onto this idea, then that, achieving nothing substantial, are the kind who like to tell others what to do and meddle in debates. I'd like to rate this book higher, but in the end it doesn't even reach the low level of the genre.

This book predominantly covers American stereotyped super hero comics. Although graphic novels, the best types, can be painted novels, or use mixed media or digital compositions, manga to realistic style - these aren't really covered in this book. The title is very misleading. The picture selection is extremely sparse and poor quality. The case study is silly. Overall ... uninspiring and dry.

Creating a graphic novel (or a comic book) is hard work. Getting someone to read it, other than friends or relatives, is an herculean task. This book is a good place to start, along with some fine books written by Scott McCloud.

I gave it only four stars because of the shallow treatment of so many themes, but that's natural, because of the wide spectrum of subjets that the comic form implies. And I sustracted a star because the writing style... well, tries too hard to be funny, and it gets annoying at times (insert a joke here!- Ed.)

Very well thought out and organized presentatation. It guides the artisist/novelist to-be effortlessly through every phase of graphic novel creation.
I truely enjoyed it and thought it was easy to understand even for those who are not familiar with comic book or printhouse jargon.
I highly recommend this guide as one of the best I have seen.