The Toledo Mud Hens - a farm team for the Detroit Tigers - once had a budding pitcher named Ed Crankshaft. At least that’s how partners in cartooning, writer Tom Batiuk and artist Chuck Ayers, scripted the main character in Crankshaft. This enjoyable volume collects all of Crankshaft’s baseball-themed exploits. Fans will enjoy revisiting Crankshaft’s reminisces about his minor league pitching career and his comic attempts to recapture his youthful successes on the diamond. Strike Four! portrays Crankshaft’s greatest triumph when, on a sultry summer night in 1940, the Tigers came to town for an exhibition game against the Mud Hens. Pitching for the Mud Hens, Ed faced the top of the Tigers lineup—Hank Greenberg, Charlie Gehringer, and Rudy York—and struck out all three. The next year, the Tigers called Ed up to the major leagues, but unfortunately, so did Uncle Sam. After his service, Crankshaft returned home, but not to play baseball. He married and had two daughters. His grandson Max was his last chance to reprise his baseball career, but it was not meant to be. Strike Four! The Crankshaft Baseball Book allows Batiuk and Ayers to explore a man’s life and humorously and touchingly to examine how only barely touching the brass ring shaped it—and left him a little cranky.

Since its debut in 1987, Crankshaft has engendered reader loyalty and affection with its wry wit, engaging storylines, and identifiable characters. Created by Tom Batiuk and drawn by Chuck Ayers, the strip offers plenty of humour but also tackles serious issues like adult literacy, school violence, and the challenges of aging. Roses in December is a touching collection of two Crankshaft storylines of characters who find themselves dealing with the incurable condition of Alzheimer's disease. First, Ed Crankshaft's best friend Ralph is confronted with the trauma of his wife Helen's worsening Alzheimer's. He never knows if the love of his life will recognize him on those days that he visits her at Sunny Days Nursing Home. Ralph and Helen's love story unfolds with humour and heartbreak. In the second story arc, Crankshaft's neighbour Lucy McKenzie also exhibits symptoms of Alzheimer's and eventually is moved to Sunny Days Nursing Home by her sister Lillian. The fourteen year struggles of Lucy, Helen, and their loved ones are elegantly told, preserving their dignity and reminding us that sometimes a sense of humour can be our greatest possession during life's trials. Through the deceptively simple medium of the daily comic strip, Tom Batiuk and Chuck Ayers address the profound effects of Alzheimer's disease in a thoughtful and occasionally humorous way. Roses in December includes a resource guide for caregivers, patients, and practitioners.

He blusters and grumbles. He rants and raves. He tries to outgun the school kids chasing after the bus on his route. But in his heart, Ed Crankshaft has a decent streak a mile wide. Patiently explaining death to his grandson Max. Comforting his friend Ralph as Ralph's wife descends into Alzheimer's. Thrusting flowers and candy at his son-in-law on a nearly forgotten wedding anniversary. The star of the hit comic strip "Crankshaft" is a gentle soul stuck in a cantankerous mood. With a supporting cast that includes Ed's two daughters, Chris and Pam; Pam's husband, Jeff; and their kids, Max and Mindy, "Crankshaft" appeals to families everywhere who steadfastly deal with intergenerational cares and conflicts. As one critic said: ""Crankshaft" is a witty, thoughtful commentary on the trials and tribulations of today's senior citizens." But, of course, "Crankshaft" is so much more. The strip's approach to Alzheimer's generated countless letters and e-mails, as did Crankshaft's near-death illness. Hilarious and clever, honest and moving, "Crankshaft" both keeps readers laughing at the curmudgeon's pranks and pondering life's real meaning in this collection, "Your Favorite...Crab Cakes!" It's a balancing act that's rarely attempted in the comics--and with "Crankshaft," it works admirably.

"Crankshaft has touched on a raft of senior concerns with humor and often poignancy, including illness, mortality, making out a will, literacy, physical deterioration, vulnerability, security, and, recently, muggings and Alzheimer's disease." -The Telegraph, Alton, Illinois Cranky Ed Crankshaft is at it again, gunning his school bus so he can outdistance the little Johnson girl, backing over the Keestermans' mailbox, and holding up a record-breaking line of cars. It's just another day for the sixty-something curmudgeon who's earned a soft spot in the hearts of millions of readers. Originally spun off from the popular Funky Winkerbean strip, Crankshaft is an enormously popular character in his own right. Writer Tom Batiuk and artist Chuck Ayers combine their talent and insights into a strip that deals with aging in a heartfelt and funny way. "After sixty, it's just patch, patch, patch," says Crankshaft as he waits at the doctor's office. In this Crankshaft book, I've Still Got It!, readers can follow their beloved grandfather figure as he struggles with new challenges, from a friend with Alzheimer's disease to another friend who's been mugged. Along the way, Crankshaft continues his quest to finally read all the Popular Mechanics magazines daughter Pam has given him over the years. Although readers love Crankshaft because the strip makes them laugh, they also cherish the panel's honesty about issues faced by people of all ages, from literacy to illness to crime. They also appreciate the real feelings that linger just below the surface between Crankshaft and his housemates-daughter Pam, son-in-law Jeff, and their kids Max and Mindy, his stray cat, Pickles, and his girlfriend, Grace.

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