‘Suffrage Song: The Haunted History of Gender, Race and Voting Rights in the U.S.’ by Caitlin Cass is a non-fiction graphic novel that seeks to uncover the thorny history around voting rights.

The book takes on a pretty big scope, exploring the intersection of race, gender, and class in the fight for suffrage. The triumphs and failures of the movement are discussed as well as the ways history got things wrong. It introduces readers to a diverse cast of historical figures, from well-known suffragists like Susan B. Anthony and Alice Paul to lesser-known activists like Zitkala-Ša and Mabel Ping Hua Lee.

At 264 pages with small panels, it’s a pretty daunting read for a graphic novel. I liked the content, but I feel it could have used better editing to help with overall cohesion. The narrative jumps around and at times feels a bit repetitive, but I applaud the attempt. The illustration style was good and I appreciated the use of color-coding to denote different historical periods. I liked the use of ghostly figures to represent the ongoing struggle for voting rights.

An absolutely incredible portrayal of the history of Women's Suffrage, this book is extremely accessible to anyone who is looking to learn more. Even if you're someone who already knows a lot about this topic, this book will still show you something! I love when learning is in the form of graphic novel, as I think it reaches a lot of people that way.

This is, hands down, the best book on intersectional suffrage that I've read. Cass explores the topic from multiple angles, giving us the stories of women all across the spectrum who fought for the right to vote, not shying away from the more horrible elements. (And there are horrible elements.) The art makes use of fold-outs, newspaper excerpts, and a variety of styles, all of which come together surprisingly well to create a patchwork quilt of history and intersectionality. If you like your American history with the unvarnished truth - and even if you don't - this is a book worth reading.

I was able to use this book in my Women's History class and it was so helpful. The Suffrage movement can somewhat boring to read in some instances, but this was very refreshing.

There's a lot going on in this little book! Lots of facts, surprising details, and a miasma of art and lettering. I found it a bit overwhelming, but kids will probably latch right onto it. It is in fact beautiful, but an overabundance.

"What does it mean to be lost to history? Just as every choice erases possibility, each history written leaves behind casualties."

Cass presents an exhaustive, warts-and-all look at the struggle to vote in America. It's a fairly comprehensive guide that includes all the major players, and introduces many names I'd not yet encountered. It's amazing just how many women worked for so long to obtain this most basic right - to have a say in one's own well-being and future. The debt of gratitude we owe these women is immeasurable.

Every library should own a copy of this book as a reminder of how far we've come, and as a nudge that there's more work to be done in the fight against voter suppression.

A great book for those beginning study of Womens' Suffrage. Good information and helpful visuals will educate those learning the basics of suffrage.

I am a headstrong and independent women. I hate when people (especially men) try to tell me what to do, expecting me to just roll over and comply. I hate being talked over or ignored because I'm assumed to have no valuable contributions to things. It's annoying and frustrating and something I think about in my interactions with men.
And then I dip into history, and I see just how far society has come, and that humbles me so freaking much. I have no idea who I would have been if I had lived in our history. Would I have spoken up? Would I have fought? Would I have stood strong? Or would I have done what was expected of me? Dipping into this book made me ask questions like this--and many more--and is one of those books that I walked away from feeling like a better person. It also really delved into the harm that white women caused to people of color in their fight for suffrage. It didn't glorify the leaders of this movement, but showed them in all their dedication and ferocity AND their cruelty, callousness, and greed for women's rights above all other disenfranchised groups. And that is very uncommon. With a BA in English, I rarely heard professors talk about how white women harmed people of color, and when I did hear mention of it, it was always in a broad sense about the movement, never about specific people making choices that caused this harm and pain. That is so important to acknowledge. History should not be hidden.
This was such an incredible graphic historical account of women's suffrage in the US. I will 100% be purchasing a copy to have on hand for rereading because even though I took a while getting through it, I still feel like there's a lot I didn't fully digest. I highly recommend it.

In this fascinating, whimsical graphic novel, Caitlin Cass explores the women’s suffrage movement of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and ties it back to her own experiences as a modern woman voter in the prologue and epilogue of the graphic novel. Through stunningly simple illustrations and a clever mix of modern and period-typical language, Cass brings the voices of many women of the suffrage movement, from Susan B Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton to Alice Paul and Ella Baker and Fanny Lou Hamer, to life. Emphasizing the successes and flaws of the suffrage movement, Cass presents this history in a balanced light so that readers understand where the movement succeeded and where it failed. Cass’s images and language make this book suitable for middle school and up readers, though its target audience is probably high school and college students, and teachers and parents might also find this book useful and engaging. Cass’s critical, intersectional approach is strong, clear, and engaging, and readers will definitely enjoy how she presents the history of the women’s suffrage movement as not ending with the passage of the 19th amendment. This graphic novel is a great way to convey a large historical movement like this, and Cass has done a brilliant job with this book.

This was more infographic than comic book. You can see how much time and research the author placed into this book. She dives deep into some well known characters (Susan B, Stanton, etc) however the gold here is the multiple stories of everyday women. This felt well rounded as slavery, universal suffrage, white supremacy and intersectionality are also discussed.
However, as I stated in my original sentence, this felt like an illustrated textbook. Incredibly informant yet maybe something I would have loved to have read more within a class setting than now.

This was a decent account of suffrage, but left some things out. It is a good starter piece that can be used to jump off to learn more in-depth things from other titles.

I received a complimentary copy of this book via Netgalley. Opinions expressed in this review are my own

Advisory: Warn your friends and family about excess fact texting while reading this book. The amount of did you know texts my friend group have received while reading this is a little excessive.

Comics are fun and, at least for me, an ex excellent way to retain information, and The Suffrage Song contains tons of information

New Yorker contributing cartoonist Caitlin Cass traces the fight for suffrage in the U.S. from the 1848 Seneca Falls Convention to the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

This was good but it could've been great. The formatting was weird and confusing and hard to follow in places.

I received an ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Thanks for the free graphic novel.*

While the content matter of the book was well done and is super important, my main criticism has to do with the graphic novel aspect: "Suffrage Song" was immensely hard to read. Some chapters were just pencil drawings, the text barely legible, the drawings weirdly smudged or quite immature compared to other, more professional chapters.

I also found the drawing style a bit mediocre but that might be my personal problem. Having said that, the graphic novel managed to introduce a lot of characters which I could barely differentiate visually. The comic also featured a lot of text - too much text if you ask me and parts, again, could barely be deciphered.

So I'm sorry to say, this was informative but not really enjoyable or pleasing to look at. 2,5 stars

For a lot of young people (and, quite frankly adults), the story of women's suffrage is something left out of their history classes. Cass's book does a great job making a complex historical event a little more understandable, and includes some feminist philosophy along with it. The story doesn't just focus on the usual historical personalities, but presents a wide array of characters and ideas.

I think there is some humor that may go over some readers' heads; there are some philosophical jokes that I thought "oh that's clever" and showed my wife, who really didn't seem to understand the significance from outside of academia and the humanities in general.

However, I don't think that should hold readers back. In fact, I think it might picque some people to do some more exploring about feminism and gender in general, and that can't be a bad thing if you're wanting to truly understand the intellectual backbone of the women's rights movement.

I received this book in exchange for a honest review from NetGalley.

I really loved this book. It was an excellent way to both tell the amazing history and work the suffragist did for women's right to vote while still acknowledging that those same women were incredibly problematic. Showing that you can both be proud of the work they put in but disappointed that they were willing to compromise their beliefs to gain a small amount of change. I also love that in the end she discussed our current world and the kinds of work we need to be doing now to ensure that all people have a say in our democracy and ensure voting rights for all.

<i>***I thank NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an advanced reader copy of this book in return for an honest review*** </i>

I’ve always wanted to read more about feminism and suffrage through the ages ever since I first read about it in an encyclopaedia 8 years ago. Speaking of this book now, I liked everything about it and learnt a lot about history, her-story, more like. It’s brilliant how so much of it was watered down for easy understanding. However, the art’s designing was quite bad—I couldn’t read much of the text due to small font size and there were instances where a lot of information was crammed imto a single comic panel. Besides this, I couldn’t help but feel the author’s white savior complex through the introduction and epilogue, not to mention their current political standings which were completely unnecessary. Regardless, I would recommend it for an overview into the struggles of women.

⊹ . ⋆ ☽ ⋆ . ➶

Caitlin Cass’s Suffrage Song: The Haunted History of Gender, Race and Voting Rights in the U.S. is ambitious, inclusive, and efficient in its distillation of huge swaths of information—and of course, expertly illustrated (she is a New Yorker contributing cartoonist). I have read many accounts of the U.S. women’s suffrage movement, and I learned a few things from Cass’s book. There are also several laugh-out-loud moments in the beginning about women’s historically constrained roles and the sublimation of energy and creativity into dresses, hats, and completely frivolous social activity. The book will be appreciated by those who know the suffrage movement well and those new to the topic and looking for a quick survey. Cass covers familiar names and broadens the scope to include others whose contributions have received less attention, including Native Americans, Asian Americans, and African Americans. At least 20 pages are dedicated to Fannie Lou Hamer, perhaps the most sustained treatment of any individual in the book.

It is now widely understood that white women suffragists advanced their cause at the cost of African American suffrage, and that our received accounts privilege certain individuals and events (though one must concede that certain women did, in fact, play disproportionate roles in the movement’s success). I applaud Cass’s restoring marginalized stories, but if the book has a weakness, it is the “haunting” motif of the title, embodied by ghosts throughout the book (for her, that “history haunts me” is the entire point of the book). The suggestion that these ghosts “echo” not only from the past to the future but from the future to the past seems odd. The introduction also explicitly acknowledges the intentionally disjointed approach of the book, a choice which nevertheless gets in the way of the story; it is possible to tell a cohesive story of disenfranchisement/ enfranchisement with continuity while also acknowledging the reversals of fortune, the flaws of those involved, and the ways in which some were sacrificed for the political expediency of others. In addition, the epilogue feels tacked on and already dated in its emphasis on a few current challenges to voting rights and the democratic process; these issues should deeply trouble all of us, but there have, alas, already been so many more challenges since the book was drafted! But I certainly agree with Cass’s point that others have put in their work, and there is more work to be done.

Thank you NetGalley and Fantagraphics Books for this arc.

I love aspects of this book; the arts, the introduction and parts of the layout. However overall I think it becomes a little too much.

I was ecstatic when I saw this graphic novel. As a historian I thought this was a perfect idea, and I still agree that the idea of this graphic novel is incredible but the layout isn't clear enough in my opinion. I absolutely adore the artwork and the version of this. In graphic novels I have always found a less is better approach works the best. I think just too much information was thrown into this. Some scenes within the chapters work very very well, and are clearer. i.e. page 91 works well and isn't too crowded, whereas pages 81- 85 are just too crowded and have too much thrown into them.

I believe the introduction of this graphic novel deserves its own thoughts. I thought the introduction was absolutely beautiful, yes it is a little too filled with words, but at points its overwhelmingness shows the author's anxiety and thoughts on the subject. I thought the introduction was so important because of the message it conveyed of yes the author's voice is definitely in the narrative, and that is SO important when it comes to historical things.

The Women’s Suffragist movement in the U.S. has a long and storied history that’s fraught with problems and white supremacy. Suffrage Song not only tells the stories of the women involved with the Women’s Suffragist movement, but it also humanizes them. In addition, Caitlin Cass uses her pen to examine the wrongs done by many of these women in the name of the better good. Cass tells the stories of many women throughout the book, many of whom history has forgotten or would like to forget. Cass favors Susan B. Anthony, but she also spends ample time on other suffragist heroes like Fannie Lou Hamer.

With all the years I spent within the Mississippi educational system, I still didn’t know many details of Fannie Lou Hamer’s story until this book. Had it not been for one specialized class I took in college on the Mississippi Delta, I would likely not have known of Fannie Lou Hamer at all until this book. I enjoyed learning more about her and I’m infinitely grateful I rediscovered her story through this book.

Art:

While I loved the content of Suffrage Song, the art was more of a mixed bag. While I loved the pencil drawings and classic cartoon styles, the lettering was sometimes difficult to read. There was a lot of information packed into tiny cartoon squares, making it less accessible for newer and less-experienced comic readers.

Final Thoughts:

I think this would be an excellent resource for educators and home-school moms, especially those teaching upper high schoolers. However, due to its dense lettering, I hesitate to recommend it to teens who aren’t used to graphic novels and comics. If you are interested in the subject matter and enjoy graphic novels, I think it’s worth a read. For the information on Fannie Lou Hamer alone, it’s worth reading. I will definitely be seeking out more reads on Fannie Lou Hamer in the future.

Thanks to the publisher for providing me with an advanced review copy. All the above thoughts are my own.