The Doctor Is In, The Pictures Are Not

Following the example of The Gospel According to Peanuts, there have been a number of essay books over the years that have used Peanuts strips as a launching point for certain topics, most often religious. In 1981, Warner Press (the publishing arm of The Church Of God, which Schulz was very involved with in the 1950s and 1960s) published The Doctor is In by Maurice Berquist, about G-d and his relationship with humanity. (SPOILER ALERT: He turns out to be the good guy.) The book seems to have had a bit of an odd circulation, in that I seem to find more copies of the “complimentary paper copy”, a paperback giveaway edition, then the more durable hardback it was meant to promote.

Well, the book is now available in ebook form for the Kindle... or at least the text is. They seem not to have licensed the rights for the Peanuts strips the original included (despite mentioning the license on the copyright page, at least of the sample). This makes for some odd transitions in the text, as the text is often playing off of the content of the now missing strip (although at least they put a “…” to mark where a strip was, so while you may not quite understood what is being said, you’ll understand why it is being said.)

New releases
A pop-up shows up

Here Comes Charlie Brown!: A Peanuts Pop-up, Gene Kannenberg, Jr.’s adaptation of the very first Peanuts strip, is not the first Peanuts book to reprint only a single strip. There was at least one board book that did much the same thing. However, that board book was, at heart, a …

Classic finds
English Phrases to Comfort Your Heart

The next book in my Amazon Japan shipment falls into the adorable category of “Peanuts used to explain American culture”. English Phrases to Comfort Your Heart with Snoopy by Nobu Yamada falls into that category. It also falls into the category of “books which are meant to be destroyed”, as each …

New releases
Look! A mook!

Mooks – that is, items with magazine-like content but sold more like a book – are popular in Japan. Many of them come bundled with extra items, and there have been a fair number with Peanuts items. Most often these are bags – a handbag or a tote of some …