PUBLISHER and Derrick Rossignol Announce THE VERY BEST, a First-of-Its-Kind Book on Pokémon History

MONTH XX, 2026 — Today, PUBLISHER and author Derrick Rossignol announce the release of The Very Best: The Untold Story Of Pokémon, Satoshi Tajiri's Global Phenomenon. The new book will be released on MONTH XX, 2027 in hardcover, ebook, and audiobook formats. The Very Best is available to pre-order now. Purchase links and more information can be found on the book website, pkmnbook.com.

The Very Best is a first-of-its-kind book: a deep dive into the early history of Pokémon in both Japan and the United States, creator Satoshi Tajiri, and his company Game Freak. It's based on years of research and original interviews with Pokémon developers, anime contributors, and others involved in the franchise's beginnings, in both the United States and Japan.

The book was first announced in a new interview feature with Rossignol for Johto Times, a popular website and newsletter that is a go-to resource for fans of Pokémon history. Read the full interview HERE. In the piece, Rossignol spoke about his inspiration for writing the book, saying:

Today also marks the launch of the pkmnbook.com website. Aside from being a hub for information about the book, it includes features like a blog by the author, daily online games, and other attractions that warrant repeat visits.

Additionally, Rossignol has introduced a new "pkmnbook" YouTube channel. The first video, the debut of a vlog series about the making of the book, is available now. Future videos will include additional vlogs, as well as general-interest Pokémon videos, focusing primarily on the early era of the franchise. Rossignol has other promotional endeavors planned beyond the aforementioned, so visit pkmnbook.com and follow @pkmnbook on Instagram to stay updated.

Rossignol is represented by Erik Hane of Headwater Literary Management.

In the 1970s in Machida, Japan, a boy named Satoshi Tajiri was so devoted to collecting insects that his friends called him "Dr. Bug." His love for the natural world, though, soon ran squarely into the economic resurgence that was reshaping post-war Japan, as the green spaces that Tajiri loved to wander were soon paved over, and many of the parks he enjoyed became sites of industrialization and urbanization. Arcades popped up where the nature had been; Tajiri soon fell in love with the gaming culture that was exploding out of Tokyo during this time. He didn't just want to play the games, though—he wanted to make them himself, and also wanted to reclaim the spirit and sense of wonder that had previously sent him into the grass looking for wild species he hadn't yet encountered.

Years later, an idea would come to him: a game in which a player could do that same sort of wandering, collecting and cataloging living creatures along the way. Tajiri called those creatures "Pocket Monsters," or Pokémon for short.

We know what Pokémon is now, thirty years after players set out from Pallet Town for the first time: the largest-grossing entertainment franchise in existence, a cultural ubiquity, a series that captivates more children every year while keeping hold of the now-adults who were there from the start in 1996. But The Very Best, the first-ever English-language biography of Pokémon creator Satoshi Tajiri and by far the deepest critical look the series has ever received in book form, is about more than just popular games and trading cards, or an entertainment empire that bloomed out of a tiny studio. The book tells the fascinating story of the postwar-Tokyo arcade scene that put the entire medium of "TV games" on the map, and which heavily influences video games, zines, manga, and anime to this day. It's the story of the unrivaled talent that scene brought together, and the unforgettable art that arcade-kids-turned-visionaries like Tajiri, Ken Sugimori, and Junichi Masuda created once they found each other.

To tell this story, journalist and games writer Derrick Rossignol brings a level of research and reporting into Pokémon's origin story that fans of the series have never before encountered. He's dug into books, magazines, television, and other sources from the period that have never been translated for American audiences, and has performed interviews of an extensive list of key actors in the narrative, including developers from the original games who were willing to tell stories no one has ever published. This includes Fumihiro Nonomura, a personal mentor of Satoshi Tajiri, as well as Ryosuke Taniguchi, an original developer of the games who has offered never-before-seen material and stories that will fundamentally change people's perception of the series.

It's no secret that, today, Pokémon is experiencing yet another boom in popularity. The series offers new installments across a variety of media all the time, and the resurgence of Y2K-era cultural nostalgia has adults pulling their old cards and Game Boys out of deep storage. And yet, no book to date has given Pokémon its critical or historical due, or told its complete riveting story with this level of detail and source material. The Very Best blends a gripping biography of Satoshi Tajiri with an unprecedented look at the vibrant Tokyo scene that formed him, and tells for the first time the full story of Pokémon's early years when it all hung in the balance before the franchise found its footing and made its way to America.

In an era of Millennials rediscovering their own childhoods and Pokémon blazing through its thirtieth anniversary while still increasing in popularity, The Very Best is poised to be the definitive history of the series and its cultural and aesthetic roots. Pokémon has never received the engaging narrative deep-dive it has long deserved from a seasoned writer, someone willing to turn passion for the subject into tireless archival work and reporting that unearths stories the game's longtime fans will be dying to hear—until now.

Pokémon, at its core, is about wonder. It's about the thrilling impulse that led Satoshi Tajiri onto nature trails to find bugs he could show his friends, that same impulse that would then be the seed of the most explosive game series the world has ever seen. In The Very Best, Derrick Rossignol offers readers the chance to reclaim that original sense of wonder once again, in a narrative history that will serve as the definitive love letter to a series that changed us all.

Derrick Rossignol is a writer and editor whose work covering video games, music, and other areas of pop culture has appeared in The Boston Globe, CBR, The Guardian, Nerdist, Nintendo Life, Paste, and more publications. He has been the Music News Editor for Uproxx since 2019. He lives in the Portland, Maine area and he caught a shiny Spheal one time.

Find Rossignol on X at @drossignol_ and learn more on his website