More than 50 years ago America was taken by storm when Al Capp introduced the Shmoo into his comic strip Lil’ Abner ; in the words of Life magazine, the nation was ‘Shmoo-struck." The adorable, squash-shaped character was so popular that it immediately spawned a massive merchandising craze: there were Shmoo dolls and watches—even ashtrays and fishing lures. Fans started their own Shmoo clubs and inflatable Shmoos managed to reach German soil as part of the Berlin Air Lift. Now, Al Capp’s two graphic novels featuring the Shmoo--The Life and Times of the Shmoo and The Return of the Shmoo—are finally back in print, together for the first time in The Complete Life and Times of the Shmoo. Soon after Lil Abner discovers a colony of Shmoos, it looks like the citizens of Dogpatch have it made: the charming little critters can lay eggs, give milk, and be broiled into steaks—all Grade A—while their eyes make exquisite suspender buttons, their whiskers fine-grade toothpicks, and their hides the softest leather. The Shmoos provide for every need and they reproduce at such a prodigious rate that no one even fights over them. Inevitably, however, Americas captains of industry wage war on the Shmoo to protect their own profits and Al Capp’s incisive social criticism reveals itself to be at its finest.