About the Author

Bill Griffith is the artist behind the legendary weekly comic Zippy. Griffith's prolific output has been included in such publications as the Village Voice, National Lampoon, and the New Yorker. Along with Art Spiegelman, Griffith co-founded the influential anthology Arcade and is credited for coining the popular phrase, "Are we Having Fun Yet?" In 1980, he married cartoonist Diane Noomin. He currently lives in Connecticut.

Reviews

What makes this story extraordinary is that Bill Griffith has definitely met his match with his mother who gives his storytelling skills a run for their money. If truth is stranger than fiction, then this must be one hell of an example of that. It boggled the mind of Bill Griffith, one of the great mind-bogglers in comics.--Henry Chamberlain "Comics Grinder"

Starred Review: [Griffith's] intricate drawing style, which exploits a range of backdrops, from blank to near-photorealistic depictions of architecture, complements the richness of hisverbal narration and the veracity and particularity of the dialogue he creates for the many relatives andfamily friends he portrays ... [A]bsorbing and moving.--Ray Olson "Booklist"

[Invisible Ink] is an elegant, serious, well-crafted book from an artist who works with a kind of serious fury that's kept him going for years and years now.--Tom Spurgeon "The Comics Reporter"

[Invisible Ink] might be Griffith's best work to date, an emotional, intimate, and almost startlingly sympathetic look at the secrets we hide from our family and how we often fail to see our parents as fully rounded people, ultimately to our own detriment.--Chris Mautner "The Comics Journal"

Already a pioneer of underground comix, and perhaps the last great daily comic strip artist (his Zippy the Pinhead carries giddily on), Bill Griffith now earns yet another distinction, as memoirist. Invisible Ink is a dense, digressive personal essay that tries to understand the fading world of his parents - especially his mother, an irrepressible and adventurous soul ... [W]ith his meticulous, etching-like drawings and conversational tone, Bill Griffith imagines his mother's ambitions and passions with empathy and stirring respect.--Sean Rogers "The Globe and Mail"