Tommi Parrish is an Australian trans cartoonist and one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary comics and graphic novels. Balancing emotional honesty with a...

Tommi Parrish is an Australian trans cartoonist and one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary comics and graphic novels. Balancing emotional honesty with a keen awareness of the human condition, Parrish navigates fear, loneliness, identity, body politics, queer desire, masculinity, fear, and the ever-fluid nature of all human relationships. The Past is a Grotesque Animal collects over two dozen short stories of varying lengths, interspersed with ephemera from Parrish's own life: diary entries, photographs, illustrations, paintings, and more.

Parrish's autobiographical elements inform their voice as a writer and the ways their characters constantly find one another adrift in their own seas of experience, current situations, trauma, and desire. How those characters coexist, how they are complicated by outside forces, and internal ones, affect our hardwired need for meaningful connection. The book also showcases Parrish's singular and assured visual style, blending clear lines, expressionistic character designs and gorgeously complex, hand-painted color.

Author: Tommi Parrish
Publisher: Fantagraphics Books
Published: 11/04/2025
Pages: 220
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.10lbs
Size: 8.60h x 6.20w x 0.90d
ISBN: 9798875001321


Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 09/15/2025

About the Author
Parrish, Tommi: - Tommi Parrish (b. 1989, Melbourne) is a trans Australian cartoonist and painter living in Western Massachusetts. Their debut work, The Lie and How We Told It, won the 2019 Lambda Literary Award for the best LGBTQ graphic novel, was nominated for the Ignatz award, was featured in many best of 2018 lists, and translated into 11 languages worldwide. Tommi was the 2020 recipient of the Center For Cartoon Studies Fellowship and their work has been showcased in The New Yorker, Granta Magazine, The New York Times, Pitchfork, Vice, and many more.