Operation Legacy and Other Stories: Graphic Histories from Africa

Catalyst Press is publishing a collection of three comics depicting African historical narratives, two of which I illustrated. The first story in the collection is an adaptation of When Satiety Marries Avarice, Hunger is Born by Haddis Alemayehu, beautifully illustrated by Fanuel Leul.

From the press kit:

"A narrative of enslavement, a satire on colonialism, and a court battle for justice by those
tortured and detained during the fight for independence from colonial rule: three comics
depict key moments in African history."

 

"In one, readers are offered a translation of a short story, turned into a comic, that satirizes the
colonization of Africa by depicting Europeans as cats and Africans as mice. The cats wish to feast on the mice and so create an elaborate ruse by proclaiming that they can turn the inferior mice into cats via education and medication, a ruse that is finally discovered by the mice, who rise up against the cats.

In a second, readers are offered a deconstruction of a slave narrative, The Interesting Narrative
of Olaudah Equiano. Several historians weigh in to evaluate the memoirs of Olaudah Equiana and decipher whether his claims are true or false; nevertheless, despite some problematic aspects of his narrative and questions that remain as to its veracity, the effect it had on the abolitionist
movement is without question.

And finally, the third comic details how ordinary Kenyans who had been tortured and abused by
the British government during the Kenyan fight for independent from colonial rule were able to
obtain justice, decades later, from a British court of law."

The book, written by Trevor R. Getz and Audra A. Diptée, edited by Hewan Semon, will be released in August 2026. Find out more at the publisher's website: https://www.catalystpress.org/all-content/operation-legacy-and-other-stories

 

Article on Graphic Narratives and History in the Americas

 A rich and fascinating article about graphic narratives and histories in Latin America and North America, their use in education, and the history of comics themselves, features Kate Masur, author of Freedom Was In Sight, as one of the interviewees. Read it here: https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article/130/1/231/8069659

Freedom Was In Sight nominated for awards

 Freedom Was In Sight was a finalist in the Nonfiction Graphic Novels category of the 2025 PROSE Awards, and is a finalist in the Graphic Novels and Comics category of the 2024 Foreword INDIES book awards.

Freedom Was In Sight talk

In November the National Museum of African American History and Culture hosted a fascinating panel discussion where author Kate Masur spoke about Freedom Was In Sight, and more generally about Reconstruction, teaching, and the people whose stories the book tells. Watch on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yssH5o9Ni5Q

New Graphic History: Oberbrechen

 The next title in the Oxford University Press Graphic History Series has just been published. Oberbrechen: A German Village Confronts its Nazi Past, written by Stefanie Fischer and Kim Wünschmann, looks at the Holocaust and its aftermath through the experiences of ordinary Jewish and non-Jewish Germans in a small rural village, exploring its impact on these communities and their relationship with each other during World War II and for many decades after, and the questions it continues to raise for Germans today.

Find out more about the book at the publisher's website.

New Graphic History: The First Black Marines

The First Black Marines: An Oral History is a graphic history written by Trevor R. Getz, Robert Willis, and Joseph H. Geeter III. The book is based on interviews with some of the first Black Marines, in which they shared their experiences of joining the Marines and training at Camp Montford Point in Jacksonville, North Carolina during the Jim Crow era, and of serving in World War II and beyond.

The First Black Marines is the latest title published in the Oxford University Press Graphic History Series. Find out more about it at the publisher's website, or visit the book's own website at https://www.firstblackmarines.org/ where you can also watch the interviews with the veterans whose stories became the graphic history.

Freedom Was In Sight!

 Kate Masur's Freedom Was in Sight: A Graphic History of Reconstruction in the Washington, D.C., Region is out now. Find out more about it and check out a preview of the book at The University of North Carolina Press website.