This special anthology celebrates three decades of John McPherson's quick-witted and zany characters, whose unconventional and twisted humor make Close to Home one of the funniest cartoons in the comics world! Close to Home Classics presents the best cartoons from the strip's repertoire, representing the major themes that have played out in its history: school, medical, office, kids, marriage, and sports. John McPherson has selected the best of the best in each category and he provides commentary on the strips. The book includes a section with a brief tutorial on how he creates the cartoon, which is one of the most popular presentations at his speaking engagements. This compendium of McPherson's funniest comics includes over 800 comics hand-selected by the author and his editors.

Some call it weird. Others, eclectic, creative, hilarious, laugh-out-loud funny, and good old-fashioned snort-milk-out-your-nose humor. Whatever adjective you apply to "Close to Home," it has become one of the most popular comic panels in the funny pages today.

" Close to Home" has devout fans that range from elementary students to octogenarians. As one fan put it, "I feel like you have been looking in my window and are drawing my life!" Though by no means a Peeping Tom, John McPherson does have the unique skill of being able to take those idiosyncrasies of daily life that drive us all nuts and infuse them with razor-sharp wit.

In "When Bad Things Happen to Stupid People" John features angry letters from readers, cartoons that were killed by the editor, a glimpse inside his creative process, and never-before-seen photos of his erasers, quill pens, and his lucky drawing slippers. Who could resist it?

John McPherson's single-panel comics have appeared in 11 previous books. Nearly 600 daily and Sunday newspapers regularly carry his work, which has been syndicated by Universal Press Syndicate since 1992. A line of McPherson greeting cards, mugs, and calendars has sold well in the United States, and will soon expand to the United Kingdom, Ireland, and the European Union. Still, fans cannot get enough of Close to Home!Now comes Ferociously Close to Home. Like its predecessors, this 144-page volume delivers McPherson's trademark take on the absurdities of everyday life. To say that his solutions to these perplexing situations is 'out there' is an understatement. Consider Gina, who decides a branding iron will be the ideal memory aid for her birthday date-challenged husband. And poor Lanny, whose treadmill session is interrupted when he inadvertently triggers the health club's offensive odor alarm.McPherson has long walked the line between grotesque and goofy. But somehow, his figures with big noses and bulging eyes connect with readers with a surefire magnetic precision. Whether it's health care or parenting, dating or car repairs, Close to Home delivers McPherson's warped world without fail.

No one walks away from a "Close to Home" cartoon unscathed. John McPherson's lumpy characters and bizarre situations are tailor-made for gut-splitting laughs. And then there are the cartoons that leave readers shaking their heads, sputtering, "Oh my gosh" as a guilty smile passes across their faces. "The Scourge of Vinyl Car Seats" delivers what fans expect from McPherson: jokes about everything from parenting to dating to car repairs. McPherson takes his readers on a journey that's very Close to Home.

"This biography, by Rev. John MacPherson, was prepared soon after Moorhouse (at the early age of forty) passed to his rest. The material at command was suffi cient if not ample, although Moorhouse always had the strongest objection to anything in the shape of press puffs, the "limelight" of this world possessing no attraction to him. During the years that have lapsed since this biography was issued, a few new facts have come to light; and some which actually did receive Mr. MacPherson's recognition have been rendered of deeper interest through the publication of biographies of men of God who knew Moorhouse-notably that of Dwight Lyman Moody. It may be permitted, therefore, by way of preface to the "Popular" edition, to add a few further words regarding Moorhouse and his career as an evangelist and Bible expositor and teacher. ... "It is impossible to read the life of Moorhouse without being convinced that the Divine plan for him, at any rate, was to go forth to the masses as an evangelist. Moreover, it may well be that his career has a lesson for the University and the Training College, in that it teaches that great things God may accomplish, according to His blessed will, through a man whose gifts are kindled into brilliancy by the light which shines from the Book of books, and to whom is given the wisdom of which the prophet spake when he declared: 'He that winneth souls is wise.'" -Excerpt from Henry Moorhouse: The English Evangelist