Through the age-old style of pantomime strips, Tatulli's <I>Lio</i> offers a decidedly new and edgy twist to the wordless comic format. That's right--<I>Lio</i> is so crafty it doesn't need word balloons, dialogue boxes, or copious captions. Employing a unique drawing style influenced by cartooning greats Gahan Wilson, Charles Addams, and 19th-century satirist A. J. Volck, Tatulli's cartoon creation is completely nonsyllabic but dramatic nonetheless, and was awarded as 2009's Best Newspaper Comic Strip by the National Cartoonists Society.<P>The result of Tatulli's creativity is a mind-bending, comical, and astute journey into the darkly detailed world of spiky-haired Lio, a curious young scientist and comic book fan whose daydreams embark from the dark chasm where wit and sarcasm collide.<P>Defender of the defenseless and the inventor of a legion of zombie bunnies, Lio is joined in his day-to-day exploits by his exasperated and sleep-deprived father, a pet snake named Frank, a squid named Ishmael, and various imaginary robots and creepy, crawly monsters. Within this humorously macabre framework of sarcasm, parody, and high jinx, sidesplitting laughter abounds--all without so much as a word.