Parody “children’s” Christmas book written by a local author selling across North America

FORT ST. JOHN, B.C. — A parody “children’s” book written by a Fort St. John man was initially meant to be for his family and friends but ended up selling across North America.

Hookers and Blow Save Christmas is a book written and illustrated by a local man under the pseudonym Munty C. Pepin, a name one of his grandchildren came up with.

The author has some other books in the works and wanted to use a pen name for the novelty books.

The book is about a tow truck and a snowblower saving a Christmas delivery truck from a large snowdrift out of town.

Pepin said the idea for the book came to him many years ago when he was out wandering a bookstore with a friend who was pregnant with her first child.

The author said they were looking at the kids’ books to fill her library before the child was born.

“And so I’m looking at some of the titles and what’s available, and I’m like, ‘man, I should really write a children’s one based on what’s out here,’” Pepin said.

“And I said, ‘like Hookers and Blow Save Christmas,’ kind of joked about, there’s the title.”

Pepin said he and his friend continued to wander around while he filed the title away for future use.

Years later, Pepin said his wife told him to write the book, as they would joke about the title every Christmas.

“So finally, 13 years later [in 2020], I sat down one fall and wrote it and doodled it all up,” Pepin said.

“At that time, I was trying to figure out how to get it published or printed because the idea was just to get a few copies done for friends.”

The book was eventually published in 2020 via a company in the United States and went from just being for Pepin’s friends and family to being sold across North America due to a mistake.

“I had submitted it for the final approvals and was just waiting to get my author’s proofs back so that I could approve the book and send them out,” Pepin explained. “But somewhere erroneously along the way, the release for distribution option had been checked.”

The author said he was waiting for his copies to show up and got a notification from the publishing company that he had earned some money.

“I was kind of scratching my head, wondering like, ‘Well, how did I just make $80 or whatever,” Pepin said. “And then I looked and went, ‘Oh, it’s out there.’”

The book had already been released to Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other independent booksellers a year earlier than planned.

“And that was the accidental publishing of a book that was originally meant to be for my friends and family.”

The author said the book’s popularity was a “slow burn” at first, but in the middle of summer 2021, he saw sales increase rapidly, so he went searching for why that might be.

“I discovered at that point that on The Ellen Show, they had done a little segment about are these real or fake kid’s books, including mine in the segment,” Pepin said.

“So obviously, as a result of that, people went out like crazy in the middle of summer and bought this book.”

Pepin said the book had also been featured on radio shows and podcasts.

There are other books like his out there where the title grabs a reader’s attention, but he wanted to ensure the story was still written in a way that it could still be read to kids.

“As an adult, you might get some of the innuendos in it, but it is not, in your face, adult content,” Pepin said.

“That wasn’t at all the idea behind it; it was if you can get the little snickers in there, then that’s fine.”

The book was a Christmas 2023 top three bestseller on Barnes and Noble and Amazon, and it has 4.7 stars out of 4,289 ratings.

“It is a kid-friendly story in which the author has cleverly tucked in some adult-ish giggles – that you will only pick up on depending on your own debauched mind,” reads a review on Indigo.

A signed copy of the book can be purchased locally at Graphicsman at 10514 101st Avenue.