Tag Archives: graphic journalism

Fantagraphics to Publish Requiem For Gaza, New Investigative Graphic Journalism by Chris Hedges and Joe Sacco

Requiem for Gaza

In the spring of 2025 the cartoonist Joe Sacco, author of Palestine and Footnotes in Gaza, and Chris Hedges, the former Middle East Bureau Chief for The New York Times, traveled to Cairo where they interviewed 29 Palestinian families who had recently left Gaza. In Requiem for Gaza, they use the experience and stories of these families to detail the crucible of the genocide, the loss of homes and communities, the appalling death toll among friends and loved ones, the constant displacement, the terror of indiscriminate killing, the hunger and deprivation, the obliteration of all that was known and familiar, and the struggle to cope with the callous indifference of a world that continues to supply Israel with weapons despite its wholesale destruction of Gaza and mass slaughter.

Requiem for Gaza, like their New York Times best seller Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt, combines comics and single images drawn by Sacco within the narrative written by Hedges. Hedges’ vivid prose and Sacco’s visceral images complement each other and together paint a portrait of dignity and suffering under genocide. The collective power of the individual stories that chronicle the first day of the genocide, the forced evacuation of homes, the targeted assassinations, the false hopes engendered by ceasefires, the dislocation and alienation of exile, the brutal killing and hasty burial of family members, and the humiliation of living under tarps without clean food and water bring every aspect of the genocide to life. Set against this horror are stories of self-sacrifice and compassion that show how Palestinians not only clung to their humanity, but morally triumphed over their killers.

Requiem For Gaza will be available wherever books are sold as a hardcover graphic novel (ISBN: 979-8-8750-0272-4) as well as a digital edition, in October 2026, for a list price of $24.99.

The Once and Future Riot is an interesting read but feels rather scattered in its approach

Compared to other episodes of lethal Indian communal violence, the clashes in Uttar Pradesh in 2013, the Muzaffarnagar Riot, were a relatively small-scale affair—some scores of people were killed and several tens of thousands displaced. It had happened before and will probably happen again: Hindus and Muslims, armed with guns and swords, riled up by vitriolic rhetoric and a tangle of accusations, turn on one another. The truth fragments along religious lines, both in the lead-up to the rampage and in its bloody aftermath.

In The Once and Future Riot, Joe Sacco immerses himself in Uttar Pradesh, speaking to government officials, political leaders, village chiefs, and especially the victims, who were mostly landless peasants, in a quest to understand this riot as an archetype of political violence. In the process, he probes the role of savagery in a democracy; the power of crowds, rather than leaders, to influence the course of events; the collision of competing narratives; and the accounts that perpetrators construct to explain away their participation in bloodshed.

Story: Joe Sacco
Art: Joe Sacco

Get your copy now! To find a comic shop near you, visit http://www.comicshoplocator.com or call 1-888-comicbook or digitally and online with the links below.

Bookshop
Amazon


Metropolitan Books provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site

Lebanon is Burning and Other Dispatches is a fantastic graphic novel that’s great graphic journalism

Much of the present discourse about the pro-democracy Arab uprisings of 2011 paints a bleak picture of their defeat. But the truth is more complicated, and moments of struggle and inspiration still recur despite the overwhelming odds against the movements’ success.

This collection of short comics documents the political and social unrest in the Middle East during the 2010s in such places as Lebanon, Egypt, Yemen, Palestine, Sudan, and Bahrain. A collaboration between writer and journalist Yazan Al-Saadi and a lineup of stellar cartoonists from the region–including Tracy Chahwan, Ganzeer, Ghadi Ghosn, Omar Khouri, Sirène Moukheiber, Hicham Rahma, and Enas Satir–this graphic reportage serves as a witness to an era of counterrevolutionary resurgence in which entrenched powers clashed with the people’s struggle for self-determination.

Story: Yazan Al-Saadi
Art: Tracy Chahwan, Ganzeer, Ghadi Ghosn, Omar Khouri, Sirène Moukheiber, Hicham Rahma, Enas Satir

Get your copy now! To find a comic shop near you, visit http://www.comicshoplocator.com or call 1-888-comicbook or digitally and online with the links below.

Bookshop
Amazon
Kindle


Graphic Mundi provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site

Exclusive Preview: Toxic Tropics explores the use of the deadly chemical Chlordecone to support the banana crops in Martinique and Guadeloupe

Toxic Tropics by Jessica Oublié  and Nicola Gobbi and published by Street Noise Books is an in-depth piece of comics journalism exploring the persistent use of the deadly chemical Chlordecone to support the banana crops in Martinique and Guadeloupe.

In 1975, pesticide producer LifeSciences closed their plant that produced the chemical chlordecone, after numerous employees had toxic chemical poisoning, and the local river had been polluted. But in the French Antilles, farmers continued to use the pesticide. Even after it was banned in 1993, planters continued to illegally import and use it. Chlordecone use became so widespread that it was in almost everything people on the islands ate and drank.

Today, 95% of the inhabitants of Guadeloupe and 92% of the inhabitants of Martinique are contaminated by the chemical, and the islands have one of the highest cancer rates in the world.

In this richly illustrated work, the author brings her personal experience and connection to the story as she interviews scores of local people as well as scientists and government officials to uncover the true story behind the decision to continue poisoning the water and the soil for the sake of global commerce. We, as global citizens, are urged to consider the decisions we are making through our consumer choices and how they affect the health of the planet and the survival of communities throughout the world.

Toxic Tropics

Jessica Oublié studied art history and was the editor of the magazine Africultures. She worked with artist Marie-Ange Rousseau to create a graphic novel on institutionalized West Indian emigration from the 1920s to the 1960s, which won the France Culture Student Prize for Political Comics. After settling in Guadeloupe, she discovered the impact of chlordecone on the health of the people, the land, and the water, and is working to bring it to the attention of the world. Follow the author on Instagram @jessicaoublie.bd

Nicola Gobbi has created several graphic novels and children’s books in Italy, and then she moved to Paris, where he lives now and continues to make books. Follow the artist on Instagram @nicola_gobbi

How War Begins: Dispatches from the Ukrainian Invasion is an amazing piece of graphic journalism

In this real-time work of graphic journalism (posted serially on Facebook), the cartoonist Igort uses the medium of comics to depict the telephone testimonies of Ukrainians as Russia invaded in 2022. In vignettes that grow ever more horrifying — infiltrating spies, bombed cities, recorded accounts of children whose parents were murdered in front of their eyes, and more — Igort also relays the events that led up to the invasion, such as the torture and killing of human rights activists. He tells stories of individual struggle and suffering with no resolutions because they are still happening.

Story: Igort
Art: Igort
Translator: Jamie Richards

Get your copy now! To find a comic shop near you, visit http://www.comicshoplocator.com or call 1-888-comicbook or digitally and online with the links below.

Bookshop
Amazon
Kindle


This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site

I Escaped a Chinese Internment Camp is an amazing example of graphic journalism

This graphic novella, from New Friday an imprint of Lev Gleason, recounts the true story of Zumrat Dawut, as originally published in the independent online news organization, Insider, through interviews conducted by Anthony Del Col and testimony given to the United Nations Human Rights Council.

Story: Anthony Del Col
Art: Fahmida Azim
Color: Rebecca Good
Letterer: Taylor Esposito
Art Diection: Josh Adams

Get your copy now! To find a comic shop near you, visit http://www.comicshoplocator.com or call 1-888-comicbook or digitally and online with the links below.

Bookshop
Amazon


This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site

Crowdfunding Corner: Realistic Future Nudes And Other Issues: Free Spirit News Anthology 2012-2021

Backer Beware: Crowdfunding projects are not guaranteed to be delivered and/or delivered when promised. We always recommend to do your research before backing.

Realistic Future Nudes And Other Issues: Free Spirit News Anthology 2012-2021

Free Spirit News is a free, submission based, art and satire newsprint publication made in Portland Oregon. The newspaper contains no “news,” but rather a collection of comics, drawings, jokes, puzzles, poetry, gags, optical illusions, visionary doodles and other untethered expressions. The news of the spirit! 

For the past few years, Free Spirit News has been working to compile a hard bound book collection of the entire run of the paper thus far. The impending hefty tome “Realistic Future Nudes and Other Issues: A Free Spirit News Anthology 2012-2021” contains all fourteen issues, including photos, ephemera and other related nonsense. Published in collaboration with Floating World Comics and Container Corps Press, the book should make a wonderful coffee table book, door stop, and a supremely effective bathroom reader. 

In addition to a small but very helpful RACC (RIP!) grant a few years back, this Crowdfundr Pre-order is the the main funding source for this book. In a perfect world this collection would be free just like the paper, but alas. The final book will retail in shops for $45-$50, but you can order yours today for the low low price of $40. Many deluxe options also exist, which include fun extras and goodies. If all goes according to plan the book should begin shipping out early in the new year and make a great post holiday gift. 

Review: A Diary of the Plague Year: An Illustrated Chronicle of 2020

Go through the disaster that was 2020 in this chronicle of the year that was with images depicting some of the major events that shaped the world.

Art: Elise Engler

Get your copy in comic shops! To find a comic shop near you, visit http://www.comicshoplocator.com or call 1-888-comicbook or digitally and online with the links below.

Amazon
Kindle
Bookshop


Metropolitan Books provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site

Go Beyond Sunset with a New Digital-First Quarterly Collective

Beyond Sunset is a new anthology, a digital-first quarterly graphic journal collecting fantastical stories about Life in Los Angeles, featuring a collective of Southern California artists and writers!  

In the debut 122-page issue, themed “Fresh Starts” edited by journalist Drew Mackie as well as writers Josh Trujillo and Glen Lakin, Beyond Sunset features 18 original pieces ranging from fantastical to autobiographical to historical—each commissioned from new and emerging talent; showcasing work from creators including Jack FosterPatrick Horvath, Elizabeth BreiMeghan LandsDanny Djeljosevic, and more! 

The graphic anthology is an amalgamation of genres from sci-fi, horror, noir, pulp, fantasy—all representing a variety of viewpoints—runs alongside written pieces from traditional California-native journalists, including an interview with Los Angeles-based writer and artist Sina Grace and a piece on Echo Park’s Angelus Temple by L.A. history writer Hadley Meares.

AWA Studios and Upshot Present “Covid Chronicles” on NBC

AWA Studios

AWA (Artists, Writers & Artisans) StudiosUpshot imprint has launched Covid Chronicles, a visual exploration of the men and women on the front lines of the Covid-19 crisis, combining hard-hitting investigative journalism with expressive and vivid comic art. Journalist and writer Ethan Sacks tells the stories of five people in some of the hardest-hit locations. Sacks is joined by artist Dalibor Talajić and letterer Bosung Kim.

The stories include:

  • An ICU nurse in New York City struggling to cope with witnessing an ever-growing death toll, as she furiously works to keep her aging mother safe at home.
  • A covid survivor retelling her near-death experience, including a last-minute recording to her children she never expected to see again.
  • An Italian opera singer whose inspiring balcony performance went viral.·      A beat reporter who sent his family to the suburbs as he puts himself at risk every day to cover the epidemic in New York.
  • An ER doctor operating a covid testing facility forced to make potential life-or-death decisions with their limited supply of testing materials.

The first episode of Covid Chronicles is live now and is available exclusively on NBC.com.

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