Reddit reviews The Key To Kanji: A Visual History of 1100 Characters (English and Japanese Edition)

I might buy it if/when it comes out, since I'm a sucker for etymology and Kanji/Hanzi component breakdowns.

Though, please do consider nuking Roumaji in the book, and only use Hiragana/Katakana for pronunciation (like Kodansha does). This is the #1 thing I can't stand in Japanese-related books, and it has been the most-prominent tipping-factor in deciding if I should buy a book or not. I mean, in any given book, what's the point of using Roumaji in the explanations, but then using Kanji+Kana everywhere else? Example: Explaining the GA particle, and then right afterwards, showing an example sentence like 日本語が好きです. (Though, I guess it might make sense if the example sentence was 日本語GA好KIDESU or something. :P)

Rant over. Sorry. Good luck on your book!

PS: For anyone interested in etymology books, Key to Kanji is decent. And to a lesser extent, Chinese Character Cognates might also be okay, since each entry has an etymology blurb.

Have a look at Outlier Japanese Dictionary.

Also, The World of Kanji by Alan Adler (and his website) might provide some info, and The Key to Kanji by Noriko Kurosawa Williams might be helpful. You'd probably enjoy her website Kanji Portraits as well. This Japanese SE question has some good info.

EDIT: typo

Those were the ones I remembered, it has been a long time.

If you are interested in using etymological mnemonic devices, I have heard good things about The Key to Kanji, although I haven't read it myself.

http://www.wanikani.com is pretty popular. I personally am learning kanji from context (not just hammering a bunch of characters, though I may begin to do that now).

Some books that might interest you:

Remembering the Kanji

The Kodansha Kanji Learner's Course (probably the one I would use)
The Key to Kanji: A Visual History of 1100 Characters <- I think most of the pictographs in this one are made up but they don't seem half bad.

As for apps, I don't really know of any/use any.

This book really helps you understand the meanings behind kanji and teaches radicals, something that is never taught in a Japanese-as-a-second-language classroom. It helps me guess pronunications and meanings when I encounter a word when reading that I don't know. Kinda like suffixes and prefixes in english.

Linked amazon only as a reference; buy at a local book store if you can.
https://www.amazon.com/Key-Kanji-History-Characters-Japanese/dp/0887277365

Replace the current affiliate link with a regular link.

This one works: https://www.amazon.com/Key-Kanji-History-Characters-Japanese/dp/0887277365