Read, To Read, Want | Graphic Novels

Luke bloody loves graphic novels so he thought he'd run a few by you that he has either read, wants to read or wants to buy. What a kind young gentleman, eh?! Let us know what graphic novels you have in your collection in the comments below! 

READ: SWeet tooth by jeff lemire 

Sweet Tooth tells the story of Gus, a rare new breed of human / animal hybrid children, who has been raised in isolation following an inexplicable pandemic that struck a decade earlier. Now, following the death of his father, he's left to fend for himself...

I really liked Sweet Tooth, what with its unique protagonist and imaginative apocalyptic setting that does enough to set it aside from all the others out there. It's not that long but that's one of the things I liked about it, as I'm really not a big fan of graphic novels that choose to be massive tomes. It's nice to have something that isn't DC and Marvel orientated in my collection, so I'm definitely going to collect the other volumes in the Sweet Tooth series. 

TO READ: BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS BY FRANK MILLER 

Frank Miller completely reinvents the legend of Batman in his saga of a near-future Gotham City gone to rot, ten years after the Dark Knight's retirement. Crime runs rampant in the streets, and the man who was Batman is still tortured by the memories of his parents' murders. As civil society crumbles, Bruce Wayne's long-surpressed vigilante side finally breaks free of its self-imposed shackles. 

Whilst my graphic novel collection is fairly small, I have quite a few that centre around the man bat in his various interpretations and settings. One of my favourite graphic novels in my collection is The Long Halloween, and I also loved Batman: Year One too, so it only makes sense for me to move on to the The Dark Knight Returns. With it supposedly inspiring the upcoming Batman vs. Superman film, I've made sure its next on my 'to read' list and, thankfully, I've heard a lot of good things about it. 

WANT: WATCHMEN BY ALAN MOORE AND DAVE GIBBONS

This Hugo Award-winning graphic novel chronicles the fall from grace of a group of superheroes plagued by all-too-human failings. Along the way, the concept of the superhero is dissected as the heroes are stalked by an unknown assassin. 

The above is my brother's copy of Watchmen and, although I have been tempted to sneakily seize it for my own on many occasions, I've decided I'll get my own copy soon! As it rather smugly tells you in the top left hand corner of the graphic novel, it is one of Time magazines 100 best novels, and since so many other people heap praise on it I can't go wrong with this one right?! The first time I watched the film I didn't really like it, but then I watched it a second time and loved it because I learnt to appreciate it as a separate entity, away from the more conventional superhero tales. I'm guessing this will be very much the same for the graphic novel, and it'll be nice to see it from a panels-on-paper perspective.  

NOW THAT you've seen some of luke's graphic novels, tell us...

• Do you own any graphic novels?

• If so, what are they? 

Leave your answers in the comments below, or tweet us @tftcblog. We hope you've made the most of the sunshine! We'll see you on Sunday.

with regards, THE FINER THINGS CLUB.

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Fictional Bucket List Tag | Films and TV

We often find ourselves daydreaming about fictional characters and the awesome things that they get up to, and these daydreams often turn into long conversations about what we'd love to do if we were able to jump into the films / TV shows ourselves. We thought we'd compile a little list of the things we would like to do before we die with some of our favourite fictional characters...as unattainable as that is! This post is inspired by Jesse, who created this tag with books in mind. We'd love to know what your list would include so leave your ideas in the comments below! 

B: GO ON AN ADVENTURE with sUZY AND SAM 

L: watch die hard in real time from a tall building across the road with a walkie talkie to catch all the action

B: discuss books and dance to little bitty pretty one with matilda

L: build my own world in a dream within a dream in inception

B: play a prank on dwight with jim and pam from the office

L: go on a ride along with judge dredd

B: run from zombies with rick and co

L: train my very own dragon like in how to train your dragon

B: eat steak with debra morgan (my patronus)

L: stop ned and co from heading south, somehow, and set up relations with daenerys and her crew 

NOW THAT we've shared a few of our ideas, TELL US...

• What would be on your fictional bucket list? 

Leave your answers in the comments below, or tweet us @tftcblog. We hope you've made the most of the sunshine! We'll see you on Wednesday.

with regards, THE FINER THINGS CLUB.

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EMAIL US AT: THEFINERTHINGSCLUBBLOG@GMAIL.COM

Keep The Car Running - Arcade Fire | The Finer Things Club Playlist

B: Whenever someone asks me who my favourite bands are, or what my favourite song is, I instantly squirm. That's not to say I don't like music because I really bloody do, and the 'music is my life' tagline graced my Bebo profile on many occasions. Cringe. I just really don't like picking favourite 'things'. "Why?", I hear you ask...What if something equally amazing comes along? What if something even more amazing comes along? What if I've forgotten that other really amazing thing? What if it changes within the next ten minutes? Suffering is real, people! Please tell me I'm not alone in struggling with the concept of 'favourites'?! 

With all of this uncertainty, I thought I'd pick a few of my favourite tracks to share with you in the hope of creating a playlist full of Finer Songs that we can all enjoy to our heart's content. How does that sound? Leave one of your favourite songs in the comments below, along with why you love it so much and we'll get listening to them all. Here's track one on The Finer Things Club playlist, and funnily enough it also happens to be one of the best songs in the world...

KEEP THE CAR RUNNING BY ARCADE FIRE 

- album version 

- live at reading fest 2007 version 

Every night my dream’s the same
The same old city with a different name...

Keep The Car Running is a seriously beautiful song but you probably don't need me to tell you that... 

I listen to this song nearly every single day but it still gives me chills down my spine every time I hear it. It's so easy to get drunk on Win's vocals, but I think it's the wall of sound that actually hits me hardest and, in turn, fills my heart with 300 different emotions in the best possible way.

People argue about the meaning behind this song but, for me, it concerns a lot of things. It's about fear. It's about uncertainty. It's about love. It's about freedom. It's about hope and progression in adverse situations. An elegy of sorts, but one that is also obviously hopeful. The whole concept of keeping the car running for someone when they're so unsure is hugely comforting to me, and it's a song that I return to time and time again for that very reason. 

This song reminds me of summer days, best friends and one of my favourite books, The Knife Of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. Pop it on your playlist and play it loud. 

NOW THAT bee has shared one of her favourite songs, TELL US...

• What's one of your favourite songs? 

• What do you think of Keep The Car Running? 

• Would you like to see posts like this in the future? 

LEAVE US YOUR ANSWERS IN THE COMMENTS BELOW or tweet us using @tftcblog. If you enjoyed this post, feel free to subscribe through Bloglovin and check us out on Twitter. We'll see you on Sunday! 

with regards, THE FINER THINGS CLUB.

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Currently Coveting | Wish List

crosley record player 

B: 

Mama and I desperately want a new vinyl player, as we've got a whole box of records in the cupboard under the stairs that we'd like to play again. I also want to get some of my favourite albums on vinyl. I saw this LP player on Lily's blog and thought it looked quite cute. Some people have said the sound isn't too loud but I've got a teeny tiny room so it'd probably be perfect, and I can always buy speakers for it in the future. 

instax mini 8

B: 

I used to have a mini Diana film camera but it mysteriously disappeared. Odd. I'd love an Instax mini. I think they're great fun and I think it'd encourage me to take more personal snaps! 

pale fire by vladimir nabokov

B: I read Nabokov's Lolita in February and fell in love with his writing style. I really want to read some more of Nabokov's works and I think I'd like to start with Pale Fire as it sounds fascinating. It's supposedly a 'darkly comic novel of suspense, literary idolatry, one-upmanship, and political intrigue'. Ooh! Have you read it? Let me know what you thought of it in the comments, if so. 

fables graphic novel

L: 

My brother got this for Christmas so I've been eyeing it up for a while now, along with other highly praised graphic novels such as Maus and Watchmen. Fables seems to have drawn quite a lot of attention over the years, as the love it or hate it TV series GRIMM is loosely based on it. The mightily interesting The Wolf Among Us video game by TellTale Games, which I have yet to play, was also inspired by it. So yeah, another graphic novel to my small but slowly evolving collection.   

django unchained steelbook

L: 

Yet another film I need to get Bee to watch! The film itself was pretty awesome and it has an eye catching design, so it's one of the next blu-ray steelbooks I want to add to my collection. It's a little hard to find these days due to it being out of production, so it'll no doubt set me back a fair few gold coins. 

john snow and ghost funko pop figures

L:

Until a few weeks ago I had no idea what a Funko Pop figure was, then Bee got me one of Ace Ventura and unleashed what I fear could be the start of a very expensive collection. The two (you can't get one without the other when it comes to these two surely?!)  I plan to add to my collection next hail from one of my favourite fantasy creations, Game of Thrones. Eventually I'm hoping to build Marvel, DC and Walking Dead collections too, with my Funko Pop characters being physical representations of the digital TV and film collections that don't have any fancy box-art to acknowledge their existence.

NOW THAT WE'VE SHARED OUR current loves, TELL US...

• What is on your wish list? 

LEAVE US YOUR ANSWERS IN THE COMMENTS BELOW or tweet us using @tftcblog. If you enjoyed this post, feel free to subscribe through Bloglovin and check us out on Twitter. We'll see you on Wednesday! 

 

with regards, THE FINER THINGS CLUB.

 

FOLLOW US ON TWITTER: @TFTCBLOG | FOLLOW US ON BLOGLOVIN

EMAIL US AT: THEFINERTHINGSCLUBBLOG@GMAIL.COM