What’s the difference between a comic book and a graphic novel?

So there's this huge festival that takes place in New York City called Comic Con. I have to admit, when I initially heard of the event, I had no idea what it was. Call me unknowledgeable, call me sheltered, but admittedly, I was clueless as to what it was.

I took action and did what I do whenever I don't know what something is, I Googled it.

I came to find out that Comic Con is one of the largest pop culture gatherings on the east coast and primarily features comic books and graphic novels. When I hear the phrase, "comic book," I almost immediately think of a magazine-looking item that has Spider-Man on the cover. Then I thought of what comes to mind when I hear the phrase, "graphic novel" and, to be honest, I thought of the same thing that I think of when I hear "comic book." So I wondered — what is graphic novel?

Since an effort is made to differentiate between the terms comic book and graphic novel, I figured that there must be some sort of reasoning for it. So again, I did what I usually do when I don't know the answer to something, I Googled it. I typed in "what is the difference between comic books and graphic novels," and the answers I got were pretty informative.

Basically, a comic book is a story that is told through the use of pictures and words, but it does not necessarily have to have a huge storyline containing a beginning and an end. While a graphic novel is told through the usage of pictures and words, it has more of a solid storyline and greater sense of character development. In essence I would say comic book is to television episode as graphic novel is to movie. It makes sense, but I guess I thought the two were more synonymous than they actually are.

Regardless of what the difference between comic books and graphic novels are, I'm pretty sure that New York City was filled with endless amounts of fans that live for going to Comic Con. From what the website says fans dress up and get extremely into the event. One thing that stood out to me on the website for the event was a question that read, "Can I bring a sword?" Well, if that's not hardcore enough of a comic book/graphic novel fan for you, I don't know what is.