Thank you to Netgalley and the publishers for giving me free access to the digital advanced copy of this book.

The Prisoner and the Writer is a new middle grade graphic novel written by Heather Camlot and illustrated by Sophie Casson. It is a story of bias and prejudice within the French political history. The main character is a man (Captain Alfred Dreyfus) who is falsely accused to treason to his country and who is sent away for life even though all the evidence pointed to him being one-hundred percent innocent.

A French writer (Emile Zola) begins to take interest in this case. The more he looks into it, the more evidence he finds that the captain was convicted unfairly and most likely because he was Jewish. It takes him some time to determine if he should fight for his freedom or stay silent and protect his reputation. Ultimately, he chooses to follow his beliefs and fight for a fellow citizen who was wronged by their country.

I found this to be a very interesting story. It was not a topic that was one hundred percent familiar with. Yes, I knew that incidents like this has happened but, this is one of the first I had come across in the form of a middle grade story. I think the way author Heather Camlot writes is easily accessible to the reader. It is mostly in verse format and has an easy flow to it. The illustrations are wonderful and I loved how there was a breakdown of the historical implications of his event at the end of the story.

The advanced copy of The Prisoner and the Writer only contained a small bit of the story. Thankfully when I emailed the publisher (Groundwind Books), they kindly provided me with a more finalized copy. It was nice to be able to read the entire thing and feel like I had gotten the full story. I think that this story is a good example of the prejudices which individuals experienced in the past and honestly may still experience today. It will open the door to more lessons and conversations for young readers everywhere.

This was a good middle-grade graphic novel about Jewish army captain Alfred Dreyfus, who was accused of betraying France. He was exiled and imprisoned at Devil’s Island. Thousands of miles away, writer Emile Zola believes that Captain Dreyfus is innocent. He had to decide whether to speak out or stay silent. Ultimately, he decides to write a letter stating that the captain was accused, tried, and convicted because he was Jewish.

I really enjoyed the book and the illustrations were wonderful. However, I was only able to read part of the book because I did not receive an completed book.

I loved that the author included an authors note along with historical context as this book is based on a true story.

This story of a man falsely accused of treason, is a story of prejudice, because the man was Jewish. All the evidence pointed to him being innocent, but still he was sent away for life.

A writer looking at the evidence could not believe this had occurred, and wrote a story called "J'accuse" in the paper, saying what was wrong with the case, and why the man should be freed.

That is the basic story.

The preview from Netgalley left off the bulk of the story, but we do know that he was freed, so that's all good.

<em>Thanks to Netgalley for making this book available for an honest review. </em>

Informative. I learned some historically significant facts from reading this. I had actually never heard of the “J'Accuse...!” story before this. Even though the events transpired over a hundred years ago (1895), the story revolves around prejudices, which are still a modern day issue.

Nice illustrations. Good writing. I think the Author's Note, at the end, provided the bulk of the history lesson from this book.