I now have in my grimy little paws Snoopy’s Organic Dog Biscuit Cookbook Kit, a just-released set of a book and three biscuit-cutters. And I have a number of things to note about it:

1. While the cover says that the book is by “Snoopy and the Bubba Rose Biscuit Company” (in contrast, we should note, to early solicitations indicating that Charlie Brown was writing), it is all written from the point of view of the company. The text does have reference to Snoopy helping select the recipes and offer suggestions, but anyone seeking deathless prose from the author of It was a Dark and Stormy Night and other such volumes will be sorely disappointed.
2. The book proclaims “over 25 recipes”, which is accurate… but it only has 25 recipes for dog biscuits. The other two recipes are for icing that goes on dog biscuits. Still, 25 is certainly more than enough to liven up your pooch’s snack time.
3. Each recipe page has either a daily Peanuts strip on the theme of Snoopy and eating, or half of a Sunday, with the other half on the next page.
4. Each biscuit recipe has something that I’m sure is making the editor of the book flinch. That’s because the last sentence on each is (For additional options, read the “storage tips” section. – that’s right, fellow copy editors, the sentence is missing the closing parenthesis. It’s one thing to have an error, it’s another thing (and quite simple to do in these days of electronic search and replace) to have the same error 25 times. I understand missing it. I also guarantee that it was the very first thing that the editor saw once a final, non-proof copy of the book… well, maybe the second, after seeing This project was developed by Appleseed Press Book Press Book Publishers LLC on the copyright page.
5. Overall, the design of the book and the box is actually quite nice. I like the use of the red and aqua colors. The end paper design, the placement of images, all quite good. So here’s a small round of applause for book designer Jessica Disbrow Talley.
6. The back of the box has the first half of a Sunday strip on it, which is kind of an odd choice. In effect, it is much like 3eanuts, a website that runs occasional Peanuts strips with the final panel remove, thus carrying the demented and depressing parts of the strip without including a punch line. In this strip, Charlie Brown gets irritated about how he never gets thanks for feeding the dog… and due to running just half the strip, he simply stays mad.
7. The solicitation promised “adorable cookie—or biscuit—cutters in the shapes of a doghouse and the Peanuts characters.” It was close to correct. There’s one in the shape of a doghouse, one in the shape of a Peanuts character (Snoopy’s head), and one in a generic biscuit shape.
8. Are the recipes any good? Danged if I know. I am not a dog. I do not even have a dog. (And just to prevent the sort of thing that occasionally happens when I make such a remark on the blog: I do not wish to have a dog. Please, do not mail me a dog.)
9. Overall, it seems like a nice gift item for someone who is an organically-inclined Peanuts-friendly dog owner without strong copy editing mania. It’s now shipping, and at the moment is about a third off of cover price.

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