2009 is over. No point on dwelling on it, unless of course we are talking about comics!
The top selling graphic novels for 2009 makes for some interesting reading. The number of older volumes, and first volumes of long running series that are still ranking shows many new readers are trying comics and graphic novels for the first time.
Alan Moore's influential 1980s masterworks Watchmen and V for Vendetta take the first and fourth spots on the back of the release of the feature films.
The 80s was a great time for influential American comics, it also saw Frank Miller putting his stamp on Batman with Batman The Dark Knight Returns. 20 years on and this story is still popular, taking the number 10 spot on the 2009 bestsellers list.

The comics in the rest of the top 10 for 2009 were much newer, in fact, all of seven places belong to the creation of just one man, Joss Whedon!
That's right, all five volumes of the Buffy The Vampire Slayer Season Eight comic - expanding on the seven seasons of the TV series - made the top 10, outselling manga and super heroes across the board. Whedon gets two more top 10 spots with BOTH volumes of the Serenity comic series, based on his cult favourite space western Firefly TV Series and Serenity Movie.

While manga titles - comics from japan - didn't feature in the top 10, they populate the top 100 with such regularity that if you combine sales of all volumes of a single series, Naruto would take the number one spot!
Other top selling manga titles include Death Note and Bleach.
Most of the rest of the paperback list is filled with titles from DC Comics Mature Readers fiction imprint Vertigo demonstrating the Canberra comic reader's pallet extends well beyond super heroes and cartoon characters.

The hard cover list also makes some interesting reading with the graphic novel adaptations of Pride & Prejudice and The Wonderful Wizard of Oz both muscling in on spots usually held by super heroes!