Aw, Nuts

Happiness is a Warm Puppy, by Charles M. Schulz.

The first and most famous of these little books by Schulz. It even influenced a Beatles song. I seem to remember we had an old copy that disintegrated over the years. This is a copy Susan got (to my envy and covetousness) as a little girl years later from a garage sale and wrote her name in. And now it’s mine!

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Cartoon. Inspirational. Softcover.

Happiness is a Sad Song, by Charles M. Schulz. (2 copies).

One copy is the one I got in 2^nd grade from Scholastic books. That was the year Miss Nowotny used my love of Peanuts to get me to learn to tie my own shoes; I was a little behind-hand with that. She had a poster with Linus on her desk: “Happiness is Learning to Tie Your Own Shoes.”  The other copy was Susan’s much later and has her name in cursive on the front, written by Mom, it looks like.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Cartoon. Inspirational. Softcover.

Security is a Thumb and a Blanket, and Love is Walking Hand in Hand, by Charles M. Schulz.

More of these little square books, gotten years after grade school at different places.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Cartoon. Inspirational. Softcover.

Peanuts Lunch Bag Cookbook. Cartoons by Charles M. Schulz. Recipes by Determined Productions, Inc.

Another little square book, with simple recipes for lunch bag meals, mostly sandwiches. Another hand-me-over from Susan, got at a garage sale, apparently, and with her name written in it.

Ranking: Essential for the Collection.

File Code: Themed Cookbook. Softcover.

Security is a Thumb and a Blanket, and I Need All the Friends I Can Get, by Charles M. Schulz.

Two original hardback editions of the little square Peanuts books, the existence of these two wasn’t even a blip on my radar in my childhood days. “Security” (1963) is my exact contemporary, and “Friends” (1964) is from the year after. After more than half a century, they do have a little age on them, but they both still have their original dustcovers. Bought used of course; “Friends” was apparently bought as a gift for someone named “Mary Anne” and has little personal notes written on some of the panels.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Cartoon. Inspirational. Hardback.

A Boy Named Charlie Brown, by Charles M. Schulz.

A novelization of the animated movie; we just missed seeing it on the big screen (1969), but it wasn’t long before it was on TV. “Rod McKuen wrote and sang the title song. He also wrote "Failure Face" and "Champion Charlie Brown".” – Wikipedia. Illustrated by frames from the movie. Got this copy years later. Always liked Linus’s observation after Charlie Brown’s embarrassment, and have had many occasions to apply it: “But did you notice something, Charlie Brown? The world didn’t come to an end.”

Ranking: Essential for the nostalgia, I suppose, but now I have the actual movie! I mean, who could have imaged that when I was a kid?

File Code: Movie Novelization. Paperback.

The “Snoopy, Come Home” Movie Book, by Charles M. Schulz.

Now, “Snoopy, Come Home” we did see in the theaters (1972), and had to have the book soon after. The old original copy is somewhere (bin in the attic?); this is a replacement. The movie had music and songs by the Sherman Brothers (famous for their Disney work), and “No Dogs Allowed” was sung by Thurl Ravenscroft! “It Changes” is the saddest song in the world; I remember when we watched it on TV Susan (then a very little girl) burst out bawling and we could barely console her until the happy ending.

Ranking: Fundamental Friend Dependability.

File Code: Movie Novelization. Paperback.

A Charlie Brown Christmas and Charlie Brown’s All-Stars, by Charles M. Schulz.

Two Signet books, the same size as a regular paperback, but bound at the ‘top’ rather than on the left side. Both editions declare “First Time in Paperback”, so pretty old (1965 and 1966), and are illustrated by Schulz himself rather than animation capture frames. We used to have a copy of “All-Stars”; this one is a replacement.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Animation Novelization. Paperback.

It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, You’re in Love, Charlie Brown (“First Time in Paperback”), and It’s a Mystery, Charlie Brown, by Charles M. Schulz.

More novelizations of the animated specials, under the imprint of Signet books. “Love” has some loose binding, and “Mystery” has Susan’s name on it (but it was rightfully mine! Peanuts and Sherlock Holmes? Come on!). How we chased these in the days before VCRs!

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Animation Novelizations. Paperbacks.

Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown, You’re Not Elected, Charlie Brown, and What a Nightmare, Charlie Brown, by Charles M. Schulz.

These animation novelizations are under the imprint of Scholastic Books. Standouts: Linus loses the election for mentioning the Great Pumpkin; Snoopy creates a fabulous moving Valentine card. All are secondhand, with “Elected” having considerable cover damage.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Animation Novelizations. Paperbacks.

Snoopy and the Red Baron, and Snoopy and his Sopwith Camel, by Charles M. Schulz.

Here’s the World War One Flying Ace in his own books. I have one of my most distressing memories attached to Snoopy and the Red Baron. In middle school my best friend Steve Jones and I were working on a long Peanuts novel of our own, tracing pictures from coloring books, adapting them with our own drawing, and writing our own script. The story was the gang putting on a play adaptation of “Rapunzel”, called “Snoopunzel”. He had his own Hardback copy of “Baron” and he loaned it to me. As I was headed for the bus it got knocked out of my hands and kicked away by the shuffling crowd, and I couldn’t find it. I’m sure some asshole picked it up and walked off with it, and I had to go and get on the bus before it left. Steve was as huge a fan of Peanuts as I was, and I had to explain how I had lost his book. His family moved soon thereafter – not because of that, but because his dad was in the air force. Man, we had almost a hundred pages in that story, and not a one survives; for years its pages were behind the toy box. Anyway, that’s my story behind these books.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Cartoons. Paperbacks.

Snoopy and “It Was a Dark and Stormy Night”, and “I Never Promised You an Apple Orchard”: The Collected Writings of Snoopy, by Charles M. Schulz.

I remember reading at least “Night” in middle school. Snoopy’s adventures as an author, retold from the daily strips, with his own peculiar telegraphic style. The ‘cover jacket’ of the interior novel of “Night” was attributed to ‘Lucy Van Pelt’.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Cartoons. Paperback.

Snoopy and the Red Baron, by Charles M. Schulz

Published by The Weekly Reader Children’s Book Club, from the inside info, apparently in 1966! If I ever meet Steve Jones again, I could give him this copy as a replacement, except he might think that it was his original copy and that I had stolen it.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Cartoons. Hardback.

Play It Again, Charlie Brown, by Charles M. Schulz.

I saw the special in 1971, and never again. This hardback was apparently published in conjunction at the time. Bought years later.

Ranking: Essential.

File Code: Animation Novelization. Hardback.

The Unsinkable Charlie Brown, by Charles M. Schulz.

There was a copy like this in 2^nd grade. The price on this is $1, and it says “A New Peanuts Book”, so an original. Yearly collections like this were split into three smaller paperbacks and sold on the racks, a process we didn’t know about until years later. Except for the nostalgia of it, probably dispensable.

Ranking: Keeper.

File Code: Cartoons. Softcover.

I have many, many of the old Fawcett-Crest paperbacks, far too many to hunt down covers for them all and to list, and with the Complete Peanuts they are 'superfluous', except for nostalgia's sake. But I will probably never let them go; some were witnesses to my early childhood. An irrational feeling, perhaps, but there it is.