NBM’s Spring 2024 graphic novels include a graphic biography of musician Nina Simone, an account of the relationship between Edgar Degas and Mary Cassatt, and a graphic novel about Stéphanie St. Clair, the queen of organized crime in Harlem in the 1930s.

Nina Simone in Comics, by writer Sophie Adriansen and various artists, continues NBM’s series of graphic anthologies about prominent musicians with a volume that depicts both Simone’s career as a pianist and singer and the part she played in the Civil Rights Movement.  The 160-page, 7.5” x 10” hardcover is scheduled for February 13, 2024, and has an MSRP of $27.99.

Degas & Cassatt: A Solitary Dance, by writer Salva Rubio and artist Efa, depicts the relationship between Edgar Degas, who was both a leader and a critic of the Impressionist movement, and his close friend and fellow artist Mary Cassatt.  The 104-page, 9” x 12” hardcover will be released on March 12, 2024, with an MSRP of $24.99.

Harlem, by Mikael, completes the trilogy that began with Giant and continued with Bootblack.  All three graphic novels are set in New York City in the 1920s and 1930s and brilliantly evoke the era with pages filled with period details.  Giant was about Irish immigrants, Bootblack followed a German immigrant who got mixed up with organized crime, and Harlem is the story of St. Clair, a.k.a. Queenie, who unlike Mikael’s other protagonists was a real person.  Born in the West Indies, St. Clair arrived in Harlem in 1912 and in the Prohibition era ran the biggest numbers game in town, defying gangster Dutch Schultz when he tried to muscle in on her territory.  Harlem will be released as a 128-page, 9" x 12" hardcover on April 16, 2024, with an MSRP of $27.99.