A Happy Birthday Is…  is a new Hallmark book that follows the basic Happiness is a Warm Puppy design of two-page spreads with text on the left, Peanuts image (panels from the strip) on the right. Really, with the larger size and the color images, it looks more like the 1980s rework of the Happiness is a Warm Puppy books than the 1960s originals. The book comes with a slip case.

The theme is, of course, listing all the things a birthday is. It’s “…even better than a good hair day”, or “…playing your song all day long”, or “…hearing from your favorite people.” This is a book for one day of the year. Not being my birthday, perhaps I’m not in position to review it.

One thing that I found surprising was that a few of the panels reproduced are using notably weak source. Disappearing lines, blobby lines showing signs of being reproduces from old newspapers where the ink has spread, and this shows up particularly given that the panels are enlarged so much. It seems odd; I realize that in this world sometimes you can’t find good source for a piece of art and you have to make do… but given that they got to pick and choose panels for this project from the tens of thousands that Schulz drew over the years, I don’t know why they didn’t just say “oh well, can’t use this panel, let’s get another one.”

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