The Sons of Liberty, Book I is the first installment in Alexander and Joseph Lagos’ 2010 graphic novel series of the same name. Book II came out last year, but I haven’t gotten to that one yet. The premise is that two slave boys in colonial America acquire superpowers via experiments into electricity performed on them after they escape from their master, a Virginia tobacco farmer. The boys are Graham and Brody, and they come under the tutelage of fictionalized Benjamins Lay and Franklin in 1760.
The book is unusual for several reasons. There aren’t a ton of graphic novels set in the Revolutionary period, nor does Random House put out all that many graphic novels, for that matter. But it provides a great opportunity to take a quick look at a rather unpleasant chapter in American legal history: laws having to do with slavery. Continue reading
