<div>Rat, Pig, Zebra, and Goat, the central characters of Pearls Before Swine, are back in their new book, Sgt. Piggy's Lonely Hearts Club Comic, the first Pearls Before Swine treasury-supersized for your enjoyment. <P>But this is no ordinary cartoon treasury. Like the influential Beatles album that inspired the book's title, Sgt. Piggy is full of surprises. In addition to collecting in one volume all of the Pearls cartoons that appeared in BLTs Taste So Darn Good and This Little Piggy Stayed Home, cartoonist Stephan Pastis takes readers on a VIP backstage tour of one of the most successful new comic strips in newspapers today. <P>In Sgt. Piggy, Pastis explains the genesis of Pearls (hint: it didn't begin at an artist's easel), why he was initially reluctant to show it to newspaper syndicates (and the surprising reason he changed his mind), the unexpected responses from readers to his work (oh, the letters), which Pearls strips worked and which ones didn't (and how he would have corrected the ones that didn't). The result is a rare and revealing glimpse into the world of Rat and Pig, Goat and Zebra. Full of humor and insight, sardonic asides and unexpected truths, Sgt. Piggy's Lonely Hearts Club Comic is a book that comics fans everywhere can enjoy anytime-even when they're 64.<P></div> <div>Rat, Pig, Zebra, and Goat, the central characters of Pearls Before Swine, are back in their new book, Sgt. Piggy's Lonely Hearts Club Comic, the first Pearls Before Swine treasury-supersized for your enjoyment. <P>But this is no ordinary cartoon treasury. Like the influential Beatles album that inspired the book's title, Sgt. Piggy is full of surprises. In addition to collecting in one volume all of the Pearls cartoons that appeared in BLTs Taste So Darn Good and This Little Piggy Stayed Home, cartoonist Stephan Pastis takes readers on a VIP backstage tour of one of the most successful new comic strips in newspapers today. <P>In Sgt. Piggy, Pastis explains the genesis of Pearls (hint: it didn't begin at an artist's easel), why he was initially reluctant to show it to newspaper syndicates (and the surprising reason he changed his mind), the unexpected responses from readers to his work (oh, the letters), which Pearls strips worked and which ones didn't (and how he would have corrected the ones that didn't). The result is a rare and revealing glimpse into the world of Rat and Pig, Goat and Zebra. Full of humor and insight, sardonic asides and unexpected truths, Sgt. Piggy's Lonely Hearts Club Comic is a book that comics fans everywhere can enjoy anytime-even when they're 64.<P></div>