The National Cartoonists Society nominated Pearls Before Swine as one of the best comic strips of 2002.

Pearls Before Swine is an impressive comic strip success story. After only a few years of syndication, it appears in more than 150 newspapers worldwide, was nominated as Best Newspaper Comic Strip by the National Cartoonists Society in its debut year-an unprecedented achievement-and its first book collection, Pearls Before Swine, has sold through four printings.

This Little Piggy Stayed Home continues the adventures of Rat and Pig, two characters who couldn't be more different-or more surprising. Rat is your typical Every Rodent: scheming, self-centered, and more than occasionally manipulative. By contrast, Pig is sensitive, kind, and-even on his best days-just plain stupid. Together with Zebra and Goat, they confront the strange and wonderful world around them, a place that looks suspiciously like our own.

By turns thoughtful and subversive, silly and sophisticated, This Little Piggy Stayed Home is one of the funniest comic collections out there.

As always, the more of Bill Amend's work you can get in one place, the merrier. And there's plenty to be merry about here. FoxTrot remains one of the best family strips around, filled with character comedy that becomes funnier the more time you spend with it." -Infodad.com: Family-focused reviews of books, software, music, and more.

Bill Amend does it better than anybody else. His ability to present middle-class family life in a way that's consistently fresh, irreverent, and downright wacky is unsurpassed.

In Who's Up for Some Bonding?, Amend's antics with the Fox family include the artist's invitingly skewed views of "normal" life: children who are light-years ahead of their parents when it comes to computers, siblings who could teach the CIA a thing or two about covert and "get-even" ops, and parents who stumble around in a slight daze as they deal with all the "amenities" of the modern world.

Jason, Peter, Paige, and their parents, Roger and Andy, deliver the laughs. They all bring their unique personalities and perspectives to the FoxTrot world, whether the subject is technology, tofu recipes . . . or a son convinced he could be the next zillionaire Martha Stewart. FoxTrot surprises. FoxTrot charms. FoxTrot always satisfies.Universal Press Syndicate newspaper feature:

*FoxTrot

Author's web site: www.foxtrot.com/

Nationally syndicated journalist Georgie Anne Geyer explores the connections between the royal and sacred felines of ancient civilizations and the beloved domestic cats of today.

Chasing an irresistible mystery across the globe, journalist Georgie Anne Geyer conducted exhaustive research into the little-known puzzle of how cats came to occupy their unique position in the lives of humans. Treated with the tenacity, resourcefulness, and narrative instinct of a seasoned foreign correspondent, the investigation yielded unexpected answers--and posed tantalizing new questions. The result is a remarkable book, bound to delight and amaze cat fanciers and adventure seekers.

It was Geyer's curiosity about her own cats that inspired her to study the history of human-feline relations and especially cats' exalted status among the ancients as royal or sacred beings. Her quest spanned the earth. In Egypt, Geyer learned of the cat-goddess, Bastet, and of the cat's role in the transmigration of souls. In Myanmar, she saw Leonardo DiCaprio, Ricky Martin, and the other incongruously named cats of the Nga Phe Kyaung monastery, trained by the monks to jump through hoops. She even met a family who dutifully guards the heritage of the Japanese bobtail, cultivating the line in--of all places--rural Virginia.

Richly illustrated with photos of Geyer's journeys and historical cat images, When Cats Reigned Like Kings also presents a Family of Cat section that describes the origins and characteristics of the 38-40 recognized modern cat breeds, including photos of each.

Baby Blues is simply our lives on paper. At times it seems more like a home video than a comic strip."

By their third child, most folks have parenting figured out and could teach Dr. Spock a thing or two. Yeah, right! Baby Blues is back with even more of the hilarious trials and tribulations of the growing young MacPherson family.

Two Plus One Is Enough is another collection of this stupendously popular comic strip, which has millions of fans.

Baby Wren is raising the chaos level in the MacPherson household to a new high as Zoe and Hammie compete as only siblings can. Parents Darryl and Wanda somehow keep up their good humor despite a tight budget, their mischievous but adorable older children, and a wailing infant. Precocious Zoe's learning to read-and to point out the inconsistencies in children's books. (For example, after Zoe reads about a bear, Wanda corrects her. "That word is dog, not bear." Zoe, however, astutely observes that the picture looks like a dog: "So which is spelled right? The word or the picture?" Zoe asks.) And Hammie must make sure his baby sister isn't gaining on him, in age or in weight.

Two Plus One Is Enough offers plenty of laughs from one of America's favorite families.