Redbone: The True Story of a Native American Rock Band was not my traditional sort of book as I don't often read about rock bands, but I do enjoy graphic novels that depict true stories and history. Redbone was a great book that told both the story of the band Redbone and the story of the persecution and plight of Native Americans. The narrative seamlessly interwove the story of the band and the key moments in Native American protest. I have to admit I knew very little about the band, except for having heard their hit on the Guardians of the Galaxy soundtrack, and I also realised I know very little about Native American history.

Although I liked the art style, I did think that the graphic novel could have had slightly more structure as there were no storyboard section with boxes and outlines. The whole page was a free art style and there weren't always text bubbles, just free text. I think this would have provided slightly more guidance on which sections to read first as it wasn't always intuitive. However, the art style switches between the book worked really well to show the changes from the band's story to moments of history, and some of the history sections had more structure.

The one area that I really liked about the graphic novel was the snippets of history. I realise how little I know about the Native American plight. I knew about the occupation of Alcatraz 1969 - 1971, but I didn't know about the occupation of Wounded Knee in 1973. This followed the death of Wesley which resulted in police brutality and riots because there was no justice for Wesley. The result was Native Americans occupied Wounded Knee for 71 days. At the time they gained support from actor Marlon Brando who sent actress Sacheen Littlefeather to refuse his Oscar for The Godfather and speak out about the Lakota's plight. Jane Fonda, Johnny Cash and Angela Davis all supported their efforts. This was an event in American history I'd never learnt about or heard. In fact, the only reason I knew about the occupation of Alcatraz was because of my visit there a few summers ago. It made me realise how much Native American history is erased from the general history of America and how much I have to learn. So I thought this was cleverly done and I think important to the band's values as they became invested in the plight of their people and the protests such as Wounded Knee.

The story of the band itself was cleverly told (although I was probably less invested in this). The narrative followed Pat Vegas recounting to his children the various points of his life, the fame the band achieved, the success and the tours as well as the relationships within the band and the eventual breakdown of their success and group. It was interesting to see how Pat and Lolly Vegas the initial brothers and founding members had to change their names from Vasquez to Vegas to be more appealing to a white audience. The graphic novel really demonstrated the conflict of identity the brothers had until they finally decided to form a band with Peter DePoe and Tony Bellamy. They formed the band as a Native American rock band and it was that we see how they really became invested in retaining their cultural identities.

Overall, I really enjoyed the graphic novel. I learnt a lot about the band and the Native American plight and although I think the graphic novel structure could do with some tweaks, I did still really enjoy it.

I was provided an eArc through NetGalley in exchange for my review.