Graphic Novels for Black History Month

     I recently picked up four graphic novels about Black history recently that you may be interested in.

    

    The first two are Incognegro and its prequel, Incognegro Renaissance. They are interesting mysteries set in the 1920s, with interesting twists. The author, Mat Johnson, was inspired by the Harlem Renaissance and the investigators who documented cases of discrimination and lynching throughout the country. Like his main character, Johnson is a black man who has a very light complexion, and, in fact, could "pass" for white. His character, Zane, is a writer, and he uses his skin color to infiltrate white racist lynch mobs and organizations. He then writes the stories using the pen name Incognegro, a play on the word incognito. In these books, he finds himself embroiled in a couple of interesting cases. 

    Strange Fruit  is a two volume set of short biographies of important and interesting black Americans that the majority of Americans may not know about, written by Joel Christian Gill.  Each book has 10 or 12 stories, several of the stories were new to me. They were all interesting, and well told graphically.