Our First Dog by Nancy L. Eady

Writing fiction is about synthesizing real events in our lives, running them through our imagination, and coming out with something new but hopefully entertaining for our readers. My past is sprinkled with plenty of such fodder, both humorous and sad. As you may have guessed from my prior posts,  I prefer humor.

This past Friday, June 27, my husband and I celebrated our thirty-eighth anniversary. When we married on Saturday, June 27, 1987, we suffered from one fundamental difference in our belief system – dog ownership. Mark’s family never had indoor dogs; my family did. I figured my chances of getting a dog were slim to none. 

But fate intervened when my husband’s best friend, Gary, who had married a year or two before we did, brought home a cocker spaniel puppy and then, over the telephone, regaled Mark with tons of stories about how easy it was to deal with the puppy, how well it was doing, and how much fun it was. For some strange reason, even when they are separated by hundreds of miles, Mark and Gary’s lives are strangely parallel – they’ll call each other to find out that they had each read the same book or saw the same film independently. They still can finish each other’s sentences, and it is truly scary how their minds still work the same way after forty-six years of friendship. In this case, though, it worked to my advantage. With Gary and his wife in possession of an indoor dog, Mark’s resistance started to wear down. 

For New Year’s Eve, 1987, we went to a swanky party at a hotel in Charlotte, with a live band playing big band music and a sit down dinner. I can still remember, with a smile, how grown-up we felt. A perfectly lovely older couple sat beside us at our table, and somehow the subject of dogs came up. It just so happened that they had available one last cocker spaniel puppy for the bargain basement price of $100, and we were welcome to have her if we wanted. 

And then one of those moments occurred that wouldn’t happen now with 38 years of marriage under our belt. My husband turned to me and said, “It’s now or never. Do you want it?” His thinking: I would realize that New Year’s Day wasn’t the best day to acquire a puppy, especially with a two-hour drive ahead of us and the lack of permission from our apartment complex to own said dog, and say regretfully, “No.” My thinking? “If this is my only chance to get a dog, I’ll take it.” So, I said, "Yes."

January 1, 1988, found us roaming the streets of Charlotte, North Carolina in a maroon1985 Buick Oldsmobile with a three-month old black puppy in my lap, looking for a store that was open with pet supplies. (Shadow turned out to be a mutt; she was maybe a cocker spaniel/labrador retriever mix, but no papers were forthcoming. We call it the best $100 ever stolen from us.) 

Life with a puppy required adjustments. We put her in the bathroom when we weren’t at home to keep her safe. That lasted two days, which was the time it took for her to completely destroy all our bathroom furnishings, including the shower curtain. She tore it in half horizontally on day one, then somehow managed to pull down what remained on day two. The curtain remnant was at least five feet off the ground, and she was maybe six inches tall. Things got easier when the vet introduced us to crate training, which worked so well we have used it with all of our other dogs. 

Since Shadow, there has been a steady succession of dogs through our household, including multiple dogs at one time. Shadow got a sister puppy when she was 7. At six weeks old, J. P. Wooflesnort, “Woof,” was the youngest dog we ever raised. Shadow was brilliant; Woof wasn’t the brightest bulb in the hall, but she had a lovely personality. 

Currently, we have three dogs, or maybe two and a half. Daisy and Penny are ours, but Max is, nominally, our daughter’s dog. When she moves out, he is supposed to go with her. I give it even odds as to whether he actually goes; she is not paying for his food or vet care.  His desirability may diminish once she starts having to pay that herself, in which case he will be ours.

One other thing is certain – since December 31, 1987, my husband has never once turned to me and said, “It’s now or never” about anything. 

Drunken Puppies by Nancy L. Eady

Every once in a while, you run across a headline that makes you go “hmm.” The other day I ran across the following gem: “Pet Store Bans Drunken Puppy Buying.” After I looked twice to be sure I read it correctly, I realized the headline makes a lot of sense. After all, how can a puppy make a good owner choice if it is drunk? And if drinking and driving is bad (and it is), how can you condone drinking and selecting an owner?

Coordination is an issue too. Puppies have a hard enough time walking and navigating around a room to begin with; imagine the effects with alcohol added. Our first dog, Shadow, as a puppy, loved to run through tunnels she had made under the bed between storage boxes at night at full speed – until the night she made a wrong turn and slammed into the bedroom wall. (We didn’t see it, but we heard it.) How much worse if she had been drunk.

Shadow and Woof:  Always Crazy, Never Drunk

We all know that alcohol impairs judgment and a puppy’s judgment is questionable at best; I suspect with alcohol it would be nonexistent. The first week we had our gentle giant, Darwin, aged one year, he tore out our porch screens in three days. (He liked the ripping sound.) With one or two daiquiris beforehand, not only screen replacement, but also a vet visit would have been in order, since his lack of balance would have precipitated him over the 15-foot drop between the porch and the ground. (Vets are much more expensive than screens, for those of you keeping score.)

Darwin, Our Gentle Giant

And let’s think a minute, people – is it really a good idea to give a mind-altering substance to an animal that loses its mind when it experiences its first car ride with the windows down or its first potato chip?  For that matter, how exactly do you give a puppy a breathalyzer test and what is the legal limit for puppies? The enforcement issues are mind-blowing.

So, kudos to the pet store for the courage to take a stand and here’s hope for the rehabilitation of all those drunken puppies!

The Good, the Bad, the Ugly and the Insane by Nancy L. Eady

This past weekend, my husband, daughter and I took a quick trip to the Great Smoky Mountain National Park (Tennessee side).  When we go at this time of year, we are hoping to see the leaves fully turned, but alas, this year, we were either too early or the leaves decided not to put on their annual show.  Still, I took some pictures. 

 First, the good: 

This picture was taken at Newfound Gap, which is in the park where the Tennessee and North Carolina state lines meet.

 Second, the bad:

Besides the fact that trees are involved, I have no idea where, at what angle or why I took this picture. 

The ugly is not a picture, but the reason for a change to our routine.  We normally follow the road through the park over Newfound Gap into Cherokee, North Carolina, but not this trip.  Why?  We heard Cherokee had been hard hit by Hurricane Helene, and we didn’t think a trio of tourists trekking around a disaster zone would help anyone. 

 And last the insane: 

Meet Penny and Max on their way home from the kennel on Monday.

And here are Daisy, Penny in the back and part of Max’s body on the same ride.

Have a great third Friday of the month everyone!

Holiday Capers by Nancy L. Eady

 In the crime fiction world, a “caper” is a story on the light-hearted end of the spectrum where the criminal is the protagonist and pulls off some spectacular hoax or heist. I am, alas, not gifted in writing short fiction, but if I was, a caper short story would be a lot of fun. However, I do enjoy sharing personal anecdotes, and having been the victim of two capers, thought I would share them with you.  I’ll give you the ending first – these capers are two of the best swindles that ever happened to anyone. They both occurred during the holidays.  

(I have attached some photographs to this; please forgive the quality.  Not only are they pre-digital, but three of them come from a roll of film we forgot about and developed years after the pictures were taken, and the fourth is from a Polaroid instant camera.)

We had been married just six months, living in a small town in North Carolina where Mark, my husband, worked as a supervisor at the local textile manufacturing plant, and I taught high school mathematics. To splurge, my husband bought us tickets to a swanky New Year's Eve party with dinner and dancing at a hotel in Charlotte, an hour and a half away. The evening was perfect. Even though it was 1987, the band played big band music from the 1940s, which my husband and I love, and the dinner was excellent. I wore a lace-trimmed black velvet dress that Mark gave me that Christmas. For dinner, we sat across from an older couple who lived in Charlotte and we ended up talking about dogs. Press pause on that thought.

When we got married, I was in favor of getting a dog, and my husband was not. His family never kept a dog in the house, and that was the only way I knew how to have a dog. But then his best friend and his new wife got a cocker spaniel puppy they kept indoors, and the friend sang the puppy’s praises to my husband for months.  By the time New Year’s Eve rolled around, Mark’s attitude had shifted ever so slightly from “absolutely not” to simply “no.” Now press play.

Wonder of wonders, the couple we were talking to owned a black cocker spaniel who had birthed a litter of black cocker spaniel puppies three months earlier.  One puppy had never sold.  And they were willing to sell us the one puppy left if we could 1) pick the puppy up the next day (January 1, 1988) and 2) pay them the bargain basement price of $100. Unfortunately, they explained, they would have to mail the puppy’s papers to us later, since they hadn’t yet received them. The couple got up to dance to allow the two of us to talk it over.

Then occurred one of those little miscommunications that happen to even the best newlywed couples. My husband turned to me with a very serious face and said, “It’s now or never. Do you want a dog or not?” Knowing that it would be terribly inconvenient to get a puppy on January 1, find supplies for it, drive the hour and a half back to our apartment and then begin training it January 2 when we both were working, he expected me to say no, we should wait and get one later. I, however, had but one thought. If this was my one chance to get a puppy, I’d take it. I said yes. And his “now or never” statement had locked him into a position. When the couple came back after their dance, we told them yes, we would pick the puppy up the next day.

So, January 1, 1988 found us driving through Charlotte, North Carolina, in search of an open store where we could buy supplies for our new puppy, a round black butterball we named Shadow. I’ll never forget the long look Dr. Gandy, the vet we took her to the first day we could, gave her and his saying, “Well, some cocker spaniel puppies look like that at first, I guess.” The papers never did arrive in the mail.

Mark and Shadow 1988

Shadow and Me 1988

I am certain that Shadow’s mother was a black cocker spaniel, because she was with our puppy when we picked her up. But as Shadow grew, size was the only trait she possessed that resembled a cocker spaniel. In all other respects, she was a miniature Labrador Retriever. She acted like one, too. She lived to the ripe old age of 16, and not a week passed that I wasn’t grateful to that older couple for our wonderful dog.

My husband committed the second holiday caper. “Peepo’s” as we call them, are the footed one-piece pajamas that little children used to wear, especially in cartoons.

I was born on December 27. Mark’s mother always swore she knew I was the one Mark would marry the minute she learned my birthday, since Mark’s sister’s husband’s birthday is December 21 and his brother’s wife’s birthday is December 22. My 30^th birthday, in 1994, was the first one with a zero at the end of it that bothered me. Still childless, we had presented Shadow with a sister in the fall, a Cocker Spaniel/Labrador Retriever mix puppy whose full name was J.P. Wooflesnort. It stood for “just plain Wooflesnort,” but we called her “Woof.”

Shadow (left) and Woof (right).  The yellow boxes were added to make the dogs more visible. 

Becky, my sister-in-law, knew my upcoming 30^th birthday was bothering me, so she wanted to be sure she got me an extra-special gift. She used Mark as her consultant and exerted much time and effort to find the item Mark assured her was the one thing I required for a meaningful 30^th birthday. When I opened the package, I laughed until I cried. The gift was perfect—an adult pair of blue and green plaid adult-size peepo’s, complete with rubber-bottomed feet. He had been threatening to get me a pair all year to stop me from complaining about getting older. And I truly appreciated the enormous effort Becky expended in finding them—a real accomplishment in the age before Google or Amazon. Becky got her revenge the next year, when she gave Mark red flannel long johns for Christmas, which he, in turn, modeled for us all with good humor.

Me in my peepo's with Shadow and Woof

Those are my two holiday capers. I hope whatever holidays you celebrate during this time are happy ones and filled with memories of light and laughter and family.

See you next year! 

Something Else Not Improved by Technology by Nancy L. Eady

 I have some work I want to do on my computer, but McAfee decided to disimprove my life by unilaterally deciding to re-enlist my account (after I specifically cancelled the last attempt at automatic enrollment). Then Microsoft decided to improve my life by announcing (another) update. So far, it’s been 20 minutes and the download has reached 33%. Even though I know I need my computer to be able to write, right now I’m tempted to throw everything out the window and find a pen and paper. 

But because I can’t really afford to do that, and because it’s too rainy and cold outside to destroy my computer properly, I thought I’d share with you moments in my life that technology couldn’t improve. 

Our adult daughter moved out in July. Two weeks before Thanksgiving, she returned permanently with one addition – a cat. We can’t keep a cat in the house because of my husband’s allergies and asthma, but we tolerated it for a few weeks because Kayla was fragile and couldn’t handle parting with her immediately. Finally we reached the point where it had to go, so my husband and Kayla worked out a compromise – the cat would be re-homed with my sister and we would get a puppy for Kayla. (For those of you worried about the cat, I am thrilled to report that Luna is doing very well, ecstatic at having the run of my sister’s house and making good friends with their other three cats.) Luna went to my sister’s the day before Christmas, so December 27^th found me at the animal shelter with my daughter to see what they had that was adoptable. (Coincidentally, the 27^th is my birthday). So, we acquired Max.

Max Comes Home

 

Max Comes Home 2

For the record, Max is the first dog that has ever entered our house that I did not ask for. The other eight over the years (the last two of which you met a couple of months ago in https://writerswhokill.blogspot.com/2022/08/something-not-improved-by-technology-by.html) I lobbied for hard, but Max is here solely because of my husband and Kayla. And that’s okay. He also is the youngest dog we have adopted, only three months old, since 1994, when we adopted J.P. Wooflesnort who was six weeks old. Unfortunately, Kayla miscalculated the effect he would have on her social life. And since her social life has not been curtailed, he is every bit as much our dog as hers now.

Mark and Max

 With two dogs in the house, life is never boring. With three dogs under the age of 4, life is nearly chaotic.

Play Time

Snack Time

Fortunately, there are times when they run out of steam, and then life gets really, really cuddly.

From Top to Bottom:  Me, Max, Penny and Daisy

When I look at the three of them, I am forced to admit, yet again, that there are things in life that technology cannot improve upon. And that’s the thought I’ll take with me into the week.

Pack Time

As well as the knowledge that I am very well loved.

 

SOMETHING NOT IMPROVED BY TECHNOLOGY by NANCY L. EADY

We have been preparing to install rails onto our front steps. (I use “we” in the royal sense, since Mark will be doing most of the work while I merely bring various tools to him). In preparation, we have watched at least thirty YouTube videos on how to install outside stair rails. All of which were very helpful until we discovered Saturday morning that not one of the thirty odd videos had adequately discussed the right hammer drill bit for drilling holes in brick. The one recommended by the hardware store Friday night drilled one hole, then was too dull to use. So were the subsequent two drill bits we tried.

Daisy

Which was how instead of finishing our stair rails, we ended up at the Pell City Animal Control Shelter looking for a dog to adopt. Our beautiful Darwin died a few weeks ago at the ripe age of 15, and our remaining dog, Daisy, a 40 pound border collie/Jack Russell terrier mix, needed a companion. Daisy is a wonderful dog, but brave she is not. One dog she met at the Shelter was young and friendly, but rambunctious and scared her to death. The shelter workers watched that meeting, then brought out another dog named Penelope. Penelope is so gentle that not even Daisy could be afraid of her, so that’s who we brought home.  She is brown and white and Daisy is black and white, so now no matter what we wear, any dog hair our clothes pick up will show quite well.  

 

Penelope

Sitting in the car between the two dogs on the way home, watching both tails happily waving and spreading copious amounts of dog hair all over my seats, I realized that some of the best things in life can’t be improved by technology. 

Daisy and Penelope Playing

A Few Helpful Items from the Writing Trenches

by Tammy Euliano

Every writer evolves differently. On interviews we are frequently questioned about our writing technique: “plotter or pantser?” (both), “morning or evening” (both), “tea or coffee” (neither). And there are innumerable programs in books and on the internet offering suggestions, from snowflakes to post-its to tentpoles to grids. I’ve dabbled with many of them and found promising tidbits in most. Having published only one novel to date (but written 3 others), I’m far from an expert, and my methods continue to evolve, but here are a few that seem to really help me.

1)    An enormous white board. You can now buy an erasable whiteboard as a sticker for the wall for <$50. In addition you’ll need super-fine colored erasable markers. I choose a color for each character and then jot details about them, linking those to other characters in a mindmap. Every once in a while, I take a picture of the board, since un-delete doesn’t work (I know, I’ve tried). There are software-based mind mapping programs, but they just don’t work as well for me, even with a monitor the size of a tennis court.

2)      A monitor the size of a tennis court. You can buy a huge HDTV for <$200 (much cheaper than a monitor) and they work great. I have Scrivener open alongside Word with my Beta reader edits, and Thesaurus.com in another window.

3)    3)   A standing desk. Mine is manual, sits on my existing desk, and can be set at various heights. Highly necessary between doses of caffeine. We have a little plastic tray I can strap to the treadmill but it gets sadly little use. I have difficulty walking and reading/typing. Oh, and chewing gum...

  A  4)    A mobile laptop stand. I take this outside and write while intermittently throwing a ball for my dogs – so I also recommend a Chuck-It to get the ball far enough away. While I’m at it, I recommend a dog that actually brings the ball back to you, instead of hiding it under a bush for you to find, but they were all out of that brand when we got our Golden (or maybe it’s me).

5)   A large 3-ring binder and clipboard. When I finish the first draft, I print it 2 pages to a sheet in landscape view (it looks like a paperback where the pages flip from the top), then read it with only pencil and various colored sticky tabs. This keeps me from word-smithing while I read. I also print out the chapter synopses I made in Scrivener as a spreadsheet, put that on a clipboard, and write in any major changes there, like rearranging or adding chapters. Meanwhile in the main text, I just circle clunky words/phrases and write notes/questions in the margin or on the blank facing page.

6)     6)    +/- Natural Reader. I use the free version and let it read my story to me. It’s far from perfect, but does a reasonable job. I’ve learned to do a global replace for things like “Dr. Downey” because it reads it as “drive.  Downey”. So I replace Dr. with doctor and phonetically spell frequently used uncommon names if it will bug me. I don’t always have the book read to me, but it does keep me from editing while I read, and I can do it while walking above dogs who may or may not be pulling in opposite directions on their leashes.

      I hope you found something in there helpful! Please share your own tips, especially if they relate to teaching an old dog new tricks, like how to LISTEN.

        

Tammy Euliano

      Author of Fatal Intent

      Physician, author, wife, and mother of 3 kids and 2 very independent dogs.

Taking My Writing to the Dogs by Nancy L. Eady

             Behind the love seat where I write, on top of a bookshelf, is a photograph frame with five pictures, each slot filled with a picture of a different dog. 

Clockwise, Starting with Big Picture on top:  Darwin, Shadow, Tyra, Mandy and Woof

            My husband and I got our first dog, Shadow, six months after we married. (Hint:  Never play chicken with your wife at a New Year’s Eve party that includes alcohol.)  January 1, 1988 opened with us hunting for an open K-Mart to get supplies for the alleged cocker spaniel we had just bought for $100. As you can see from the picture—Shadow is at the bottom right—she was not a pure-blooded cocker spaniel but a lab cocker mix. It was the best swindle ever.

            Shadow decided she was my husband’s dog early on. She tolerated me, but at times she would eye me and think, “You know, we really don’t need you around here.”  But by the time she was 7, she was slowing down and seemed lonely. With gentle nudging, my husband acquiesced to getting a second dog if we could find another lab/cocker mix. Thanks to my contacts at work, we found dog number 2, Woof. (The top left photograph.)  It took one day before Shadow became ecstatically aware that she had acquired a puppy. And I was no longer superfluous to Shadow’s world, since I could run interference on Woof when Shadow wanted to monopolize Mark.

            Neither Shadow nor Woof did a lot of writing with me between my working full time while going to law school and then beginning to practice law in 1998. By 2003, though, when Shadow died, the idea of writing took hold of me again. We had to help Woof first. She was very unhappy as an only dog.

            Enter Tyra, our first pound puppy. (Bottom left picture). Tyra shared a run with another dog at the pound. The sign on the run read, “My name is Tyra and I sit.”  She never sat on cue any other time in our lives together, but the one time it counted, she did.

            Now, I was ready to begin writing, until Fate intervened again with the arrival of our daughter, age three years and one month, on December 1, with only 30-days’ notice. The adoption of both Woof and Tyra into our family before Kayla reassured her. Our saying is “Once a member of the pack, always a member of the pack.”   

            Then Kayla turned six and decided she needed a dog of her own. As she explained it, Mark had a dog (Tyra) and I had a dog (Woof), so she needed one, too. In a moment of insanity, my husband sent me and Kayla off to the pound to see if there was either a lab or a golden retriever available. Instead, we returned with Mandy. (Center left). Mandy was a husky/basset-hound mix, with the body shape of a basset hound, the fur of a husky and the most amazing eyes—one brown and one blue, with a smidgen of blue in the brown eye.  With three dogs and one child, life became even crazier, but I finally started writing—in the form of a blog where I had the chance to share the crazy things that were happening in our house.

            It wasn’t until after Woof died that we adopted Darwin (Darwin James is a lab/Great Dane mix, shown in the top left photo). By this time, I had graduated from my blog to working on a full-fledged mystery novel. Tyra died a few years after we got Darwin, but Darwin and Mandy were best buddies until Mandy died in September 2019. I didn’t give him time to get lonely, though; Darwin has never liked being an only dog. He seems to think being by himself means he is going to be abandoned. So about a week after Mandy died, I adopted Daisy. At 8 months old, she is our first puppy since Woof, and Kayla’s first puppy ever. (I need to find a new photo frame with six spots in it.)  To be honest, I had forgotten how much work was involved with a puppy, but we hit that magical point where house training kicks in within a couple of months, and the rest has been smooth sailing. And she has adapted to the writing regime quite well; she likes to curl up beside me on the love seat while I write. Darwin naps on his bed by the fireplace.

Daisy on the Love Seat

            While both dogs are weak on plot points and meaningful critiques, they do like to participate in phone conversations. Apparently, the ringing and answering of a telephone between the hours of 8 and 5 is the international signal for group barking. And they listen to my stories. In the end, isn’t that what all writers want—someone to share their stories with?

An Interview with A. R. Kennedy by E. B. Davis

Saving Ferris by A. R. Kennedy

Is your pet family or property?

When Cecilia’s husband dies, she’s forced to become his dog's caregiver, something she does not immediately warm to. But when Ferris’s life is threatened by an intruder, she shoots the intruder to save the golden retriever. The law says Ferris is property but she's learning he's family.

http://www.arkennedyauthor.com/

When I found Saving Ferris on Kindle Unlimited, I downloaded it. Look at the cover. Who could resist a good dog read? But I found it was more than a dog story. A. R. Kennedy primarily focuses on how state statutes define dogs. That’s the legal issue, but the personal backstory will evoke readers’ sympathy.

Cecilia, her main character, is a young widow, who moved to the small town of Folley with her husband, Joey, after his father’s death, to run the family construction business. Joey dies in a construction accident. Cecilia’s a city girl. She’s not used to animals or the provincial thinking of the townsfolk. She makes her living online so she can live anywhere. Joey and Cecilia have a good marriage, one that can survive Joey spending a thousand dollars on a dog and bringing Ferris home unexpectedly.

Many of the scenes depict the court case and witness testimony. I thought it might be dry and boring. It wasn’t. In fact, some of it was amusing. Go over the Amazon and download this book—you’ll like it, too.

Please welcome A. R. Kennedy to WWK.                                     E. B. Davis  

Do you own a dog?

Yes, I have two. One is a four-year-old rescue. We think he is a schnauzer yorkie mix. The other is a mini schnauzer puppy.

You state that the story was the result of attending the Writers’ Police Academy. What happened there that prompted the story?

If you are a fiction crime writer, the Writers’ Police Academy is an amazing experience. I’ve attended for over seven years. They have classes on all aspects of law enforcement. FBI, DEA, Secret Service agents as well as local police officers give lectures. Classes are also held on criminal profiling, crime scene investigation and emergency procedures and so much more. Many classes are hands-on. Lee Lofland organizes the informative, informational and fun event.

I attended a class on guns that led to a discussion on self-defense laws, which are different in every state. My next class was taught by a K9 officer. The teacher, a K9 handler, informed us their dogs are considered property. And the idea for Saving Ferris was born.

Ferris is a golden retriever. Most goldens are known as the blond airheads of the dog world. Not without their charms, of course, but Ferris was named due to his circuitous running, like a Ferris Wheel. When Joey unexpectantly brings him home, Cecilia asks if the name is due to his behavior, like Ferris Bueller’s. So, when Joey says Ferris has failed service dog training, it’s of no surprise. But the surprise to me was that a Golden would be trained for that at all. Are there many golden retriever service dogs?

Yes, golden retrievers are often used as service dogs. I chose a golden retriever because years ago my parents were asked to foster golden retriever service dogs. Because we would become too attached to one, they declined the offer.

I couldn’t locate any statistics but many service dog training websites note that golden retrievers are often used because they are intelligent, trainable, gentle, and loyal dogs.

Cecilia considers Ferris to be Joey’s dog, even after Joey dies. But that all changes after the attack. When Cecilia gets home from the hospital, she freaks out that Ferris isn’t in her home. Why the change?

It’s in the moment of the attack and its aftermath that she realizes how much time she has spent with Ferris since her husband’s death and how much she actually loves him.

Unfortunately, we often realize how much we love someone only after they are gone.

Cecilia is a strong woman. How did she get that way? Is there a reason her sister and she don’t get along?

Cecilia is strong because life has forced her to be strong. Her mother died when she was a teenager. Her father handled his grief by escaping into drugs, leaving her to raise her younger sister.

Cecilia and her sister don’t get along because some siblings just don’t. Her sister doesn’t appreciate the sacrifices that Cecilia made for her (and she’s tired of hearing about it). Plus, they view their father very differently. Cecilia sees him as a lost cause, but her sister thinks he’s redeemable.

You started the story in the present after Joey has died but show the past with him living in subsequent chapters. What did you achieve by this presentation?

I felt this presentation revealed Cecilia’s character in the best way. She can come off as cold, but through her love for Joey and their relationship you learn she is not. This is furthered by the development of the relationship with Holden.

Where is Folley? It seemed very provincial.

Folley is a fictional town in the Midwest.

Cecilia’s loving relationships with her father-in-law and husband guide her decisions to stay in Folley. What are her obligations to them and what was in their wills?

When her father-in-law learns he is ill, he has frank discussions with both his children. He wanted to ensure a fair division of his estate and avoid any acrimony between his two children after his death.

He knew his daughter and her husband could not be trusted with the business he had worked most of his life developing. He knew Joey would be better suited for it. The business was important to Joey’s father, so it was important to him, and then to Cecilia as well. Joe Senior treated Cecilia as a daughter when she joined the family and she wanted to repay that love.

Are you a lawyer?

No, I work in healthcare. I have a Doctorate in Physical Therapy and a Master’s in Business Administration. 

Cecilia was in her backyard with Ferris when a local eighteen-year-old delinquent attacks, assaulting, hurting, and trying to rape her. She fights back and runs into the house. Joey tried and failed to train her to shoot a gun, but he impressed the fact that the police would need more than twenty minutes to get to their house. Cecilia gets the gun. By that time, the attacker has a knife to Ferris’s throat warning he will cut his throat. Cecilia fires a warning shot that goes astray and actually kills the attacker by accident. The focus of her second-degree murder trial is the question of how pets are treated under the law. How do laws differ among states/federal law? And why is that the focus of her defense?

There are three types of self-defense laws—Stand Your Ground, Castle Doctrine, and Duty to Retreat. Each state has their own laws. Stand Your Ground states, one can use deadly force to defend yourself if you fear for your or someone else’s life, or are afraid of serious bodily injury.

In Castle Doctrine states, like Folley, if you are in your home, you are not required to retreat prior to using deadly force in self-defense.

Duty to Retreat states, you have a duty to retreat when possible (even in your own house) before using deadly force.

Regardless of state, you must prove you felt your life was endangered. You can protect yourself or others but not property. In all states, pets are considered property.

Reminder, I am not a lawyer and these are very basic explanations.

Your courtroom narrative is riveting as Cecilia’s defense lawyer gets witnesses to define how they treat their pets, as property or family. But I found the testimony of the veterinarian and the K-9 cop the most interesting. How did their views differ?

Thank you! “Riveting”— I need that on the cover!

To a K9 officer, their dog is their partner. According to all the K9 handlers I’ve met, the dog lives with them. Often when the dog retires, they live with the handler. There is a great bond between the two officers.

To a veterinarian, treating your pet is their livelihood. Yes, I’m sure they love their jobs and love your pet, but it’s a business. I’ve seen more than one vet who has overcharged/overtreated in order to plump up the bill, which they ensure is paid before you leave the building. (Please note, doctors for humans do this as well.)

The malpractice premiums I found very interesting and supported Sewell’s argument.

**Just in case my vet is reading this, I’m very blessed to have a good veterinarian. Over the past five years, he has treated three of my dogs and treats all of us with kindness and compassion. And when my Heidi passed away last year, they did let me leave without paying. (I went back the next day.) They saved me from bawling in a crowded lobby.

Why would the townsfolk defend one of their own, even though he was a known low life criminal? I was surprised his brother’s actions against Cecilia wasn’t brought into the trial. Didn’t it cause anyone to stop supporting the murdered man or his mother?

As a native New Yorker who has lived in many states throughout the country, I have found I was often treated as an outsider. In my first year after college, a co-worker once asked me, “Are you one of those New Yorkers?” It was not a compliment. For some towns, (and even some well-known cities), once an outsider, always an outsider.

The brother in law’s actions were deplorable, but defense lawyer Sewell couldn’t use it to defend her. It doesn’t matter why the attacker was there, Cecilia shot him. The attacker’s actions, why he was on her property, are only known to the police, and prosecutor office, and defense team. The rest of the town are unaware of it.

Is this a one-off book? What else do you write?

Yes, this is a stand-alone novel.

I have also written The Nathan Miccoli mystery series, which started on Valentine’s Day! (Available here. https://www.amazon.com/A-R-Kennedy/e/B00GOKCWHE)

I’m currently seeking representation for a cozy mystery series, The Traveling Detective.

                                         

Cormac McCarthy Loves My Dog

by Linda Rodriguez

I’m a big rescue-animal person. I’ve had rescue dogs and cats all my adult life. When I’ve lost a dog to the cancers and other vicissitudes of old age, always a heartbreaking situation, I go looking for a replacement in the dogs on death row—those scheduled for euthanasia. I have found so many wonderful dogs in this way.

I’m thinking about this because next week is the adoption anniversary of our current dog, Dyson. Eight years ago this fall, we had lost our much-beloved sixteen-year-old Husky-Sharpei, who’d been adopted at seven on what was supposed to be the last day of her life and given us so many more wonderful years. After grieving for a month, we began looking online at the adoptable dogs of local shelters. Hearing that the Kansas City Animal Shelter was overcrowded, we decided to go visit and adopt one of their desperate dogs slated for death.

I walked into the shelter the week before Thanksgiving with certain criteria in mind. I wanted an older female dog who was already housebroken and calm. I knew older dogs were harder to find homes and figured I’d be able to choose among several older females. No stubborn, rambunctious, untrained young males for me. I was no longer the young, strong woman who had trained such dogs years before.

As luck would have it, someone showed us an emaciated, big, male dog with a strange brindle coat, starved and sad-eyed, who was scheduled for euthanasia the next day. He walked placidly for me on the leash and looked at us without hope. My husband and I were hooked by those big sad eyes. Even when we were informed that he had heartworm, which costs hundreds of dollars to treat, we weren’t dissuaded and signed up to adopt him that day, all the time telling ourselves how crazy this was. As we signed papers and laid down money, people who worked at the shelter began to filter into the office. “Are you the folks taking Dyson?” they would ask, and then shake our hands and thank us, telling us what a good dog he was. Then, we found out he was less than a year old, big as he was—and that he was a breed of dog we’d never heard of before, the Plott hound.

Dyson, who should have weighed at least 70 pounds at that time, was so starved that he weighed less than 40 pounds. (The first photos of him are then, the later photo of him now.) He had never been neutered and never been in a house, we discovered. We would have to keep this long-legged creature crated for weeks at first because of the heartworm treatment. If he became too active, he could have a stroke. What possessed us to continue and sign up for this dog, I can’t begin to understand.

Thus, began my education in the dogs Cormac McCarthy calls “the ninja warriors of dogdom” and of whom he says, “They are just without fear.” Developed in the 1700s by a German immigrant family (from whom they get their name) in the Great Smoky Mountains who never sold any outside of the family until after World War II, Plott hounds are the state dog of North Carolina. They were bred for centuries as trackers and hunters of bear. They are practically triple-jointed and can perform acrobatic feats while avoiding the claws of huge bears they have brought to bay. They are highly valued by big game hunters all over the world, who pay thousands of dollars for trained Plott hounds to use to hunt bear, cougars, and other large predators.

We don’t hunt. While on a leash for walks, Dyson constantly charges into the hedges and emerges with a big possum or feral cat in his mouth, which we’ll make him drop—always uninjured since he has the softest mouth. Other things we’ve discovered about

Plotts are that they are extra-smart and yet goofy and playful. And so he is. Also, loyal, affectionate, protective, and he loves fibers and textiles, often in early days pulling my knitting out without harming it and lying before it confused at why he couldn’t do what Mommy does with those sticks.

Though he was the opposite of the placid, female, older dog we wanted and he truly does seem to be without fear, Dyson has been the perfect dog for us, always a source of fun and joy. And the inevitable mischief that a young, boisterous male (for once he regained his health, he regained his personality) commits is a small price to pay for the love he shows when he lays his massive head in my lap and looks at me with love in his big, now-happy eyes.

That lack of fear that McCarthy so admired and the resilience that allowed Dyson to bounce back from abuse, starvation, and potentially fatal illness are two qualities I'm trying to achieve for myself as a writer. Dyson refuses to believe that he can't take on any challenge that presents itself. He's absolutely sure that he's equal to any task. Such confidence drives out fear, and I'm trying to cultivate it in myself. I suspect that belief in self is also linked to the resilience Dyson has exhibited, that ability I desire to be able to recover from professional, physical, and financial disaster. The sad dog I rescued has become my sensei in professional matters. If Dyson had opposable thumbs, how would he handle this? has become a recurrent question.

Happy birthday to His Majesty Dyson the Toy King Sweetie Boy Rodriguez-Furnish!

Linda Rodriguez's Plotting the Character-Driven Novel, based on her popular workshop, and The World Is One Place: Native American Poets Visit the Middle East, an anthology she co-edited, are her newest books. Dark Sister: Poems will be published in May, 2018, and Every Family Doubt, her fourth mystery novel featuring Cherokee campus police chief, Skeet Bannion, will appear August 15, 2018. Her three earlier Skeet novels—Every Hidden Fear, Every Broken Trust, and Every Last Secret—and her books of poetry—Skin Hunger and Heart's Migration—have received critical recognition and awards, such as St. Martin's Press/Malice Domestic Best First Novel, International Latino Book Award, Latina Book Club Best Book of 2014, Midwest Voices & Visions, Elvira Cordero Cisneros Award, Thorpe Menn Award, and Ragdale and Macondo fellowships. Her short story, “The Good Neighbor,” published in the anthology, Kansas City Noir, has been optioned for film.

Rodriguez is past chair of the AWP Indigenous Writer’s Caucus, past president of Border Crimes chapter of Sisters in Crime, founding board member of Latino Writers Collective and The Writers Place, and a member of International Thriller Writers, Wordcraft Circle of Native American Writers and Storytellers, and Kansas City Cherokee Community. Visit her at http://lindarodriguezwrites.blogspot.com