Naoki Urasawa's 20th Century Boys

OK, this is not exactly a book but because of its complex plot and carefully constructed characters it can be enjoyed by the most exigent reader. I read it in my 1st year of college and trust me, it changed my life. 20th Century Boys tells the story of a group of friends led by Kenji Endo who as children imagined a fantastic story full of robots and biological attacks, where they were fighting against an evil organization whose aim was to destroy the world. Nothing extraordinary (at least for a Japanese child... as a child I never even thought of using biological weapons...), until the same group of friends 20 years later begins to witness acts that are suspiciously similar to those described in the book where they recorded they childhood fantasies. After that, they realize that those incidents are orchestrated by the leader of a religious sect who calls himself simply "friend" (tomodachi in Japanese) and who always wears a mask with a symbol that Kenji and his friends had drawn as children... and don't worry, I haven't spoiled any important part of the story so far, things I described here only cover the first volume of the 24 that include the whole story, so as you can imagine, with this manga you will have at least about 10 or 12 hours of valuable entertainment. 

One of the main themes of the argument of this book is the Freemasonry because as you get deeper into this plot you begin to notice some parallels with the urban myths connected to this elite organization. To prove you that below I show you the symbol used by the "friend"'s organization:

20th Century Boys is a work of master Naoki Urosawa, probably known by many of you for his previous manga Monster which, by the way, you should read if you haven't yet. Urosawa's seal in all his works is his deep understanding of the human nature which enables him to create characters that you really feel identified with, whose faults, virtues and motivations are parpable and believable. The quality of the manga is so huge that in Japan the film trilogy based on this artwork is considered an Eastern equivalent of our Matrix and The Lord of the Rings trilogies. Definitely a modern classic. In Spanish it was published by Planeta deAgostini but if you consider buying this work I strongly recommend you the English edition which is a little more expensive but it's cover design will simply delight the fans.