Title Details

Jason Rodriguez is a writer and editor of numerous books and graphic novels, including the first volume of Colonial Comics, District Comics: An Unconventional History of Washington, D.C., Try Looking Ahead, and Postcards: True Stories That Never Happened. His work has been nominated for an Eisner Award and 8 Harvey Awards. Colonial Comics, Volume II represents Jason Rodriguez’s most ambitious project to date. Jason lives in Arlington, VA with his wife and their two dogs, four cats, and a parrot. You can usually find him on a street corner, staring out into the future.

“Jason Rodriguez has edited a visually attractive book that will encourage young readers to acquire a more meaningful understanding of Colonial America's history by helping make the stories come alive.”  —Julian L. Lapides, past president, Baltimore Heritage, Inc.“This book is smart, surprising, fun and educational. Each story has its own visual and verbal style but all will delight, intrigue, and enlighten both novice and expert alike.”  —James David Moran, Director of Outreach, American Antiquarian Society“Rodriguez manages a good balance throughout – from wordless tales to text-heavy historical factoids. From almost comic lighthearted illustrations to woodblock type carvings and beautiful pastel watercolors [...] The stories are interesting enough to read for enjoyment value; but of course, the historical value cannot be understated. Since these are stories that rarely have been told outside of academic circles, there isn’t any repetition of typical historical discussions about the founding of the colonies. Each story should be quite new to the reader. As well, the length of the stories make this a great book to use as a reading assignment.”  —Online Eccentric Librarian blog“A beautiful anthology of colonial historical vignettes [...] the book is best suited for middle graders to high school and the book's website is making educator guides for the stories. However, the material is perfectly satisfying to the adult reader and the art is varied and showcases a variety of styles. I found it quite impressive and highly readable.”  —It's All Comics To Me blog“I was blown away. The stories are presented in varying styles, but always with the emphasis on the storytelling. Each story was crafted out of a surprising amount of information, but never felt, forgive the term, “educational.” Sure, I learned a lot from reading the book, but it was presented in such an aesthetically pleasing way that it didn’t feel like I was being tricked into learning, the way so many educational comics do.”  —Brian Salvatore, Multiversity Comics“In the first of three proposed anthologies, beautifully produced comics reveal the rich, often overlooked lives of Native Americans, women, and servants in colonial New England. Each of the two dozen selections is based on primary sources, and most pieces feature individuals whose names can be found fairly readily elsewhere. Unlike those other resources, however, the selections in this anthology take the vantage point of more marginalized groups, bringing attention to the people history has tended to view as mere props to stories featuring white male upper-class settlers.”  —Booklist