(There are no clues in the strips leading up to this one)

I assume this is somehow analogous to a golf handicap?

Even setting aside the fact that The Giving Tree is possibly the most objectionable children’s book that doesn’t have any Berenstain Bears in it, what’s the joke here? And why this book?

If anything, I’d think Spook would prefer The Count of Monte Cristo.

The irony, of course, is that if this strip were written today, it would have been published just in time for Silverstein’s birthday.

This actually makes less sense the more I think about it.