Dog Crazy (25 page)

MEG DONOHUE
is the
USA Today
bestselling author of
How to Eat a Cupcake
and
All the Summer Girls
. She has an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University and a BA in comparative literature from Dartmouth College. Born and raised in Philadelphia, she now lives in San Francisco with her husband, three young daughters, and dog.

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What inspired you to write this story? Maggie insists that the relationships we form with our dogs can be just as profound and emotional as our relationships with other humans. Were any of the relationships between your human characters and their dogs inspired by your personal experiences as a pet owner?

I've had the privilege of loving many dogs in my life, but this particular story was inspired by a Portuguese water dog named King Oberon—Oe (pronounced O-E) for short. Oe entered our family when he was a puppy and I was a senior in high school; he later moved with me to New Hampshire (where I went to college), New York City (where I worked and went to graduate school), Evanston, Illinois (during which time I married my husband), and finally to San Francisco. He was at my side through every twist and turn of my young adult life. Oe died when he was thirteen years old, shortly before the birth of my first child. I can't help wondering if he let go at that moment in time because he sensed that the healing love of a new baby would help to mend my broken heart. He was one of my very best friends—my “dog soul mate,” as Maggie says of her dog, Toby—and I continue to miss him every day. It's a loss I'll always carry with me, alongside the many life lessons I learned from him.

A couple of years ago, I began to think of a story told from the perspective of a therapist who specializes in helping people grieve the loss of their pets—a woman who, despite her expertise, finds herself in considerable emotional turmoil when her own dog dies. After a bit of Internet research revealed that pet bereavement counseling services exist, I contacted a local counselor with experience in this niche of grief therapy and she kindly allowed me to pick her brain on the subject. Our conversation fascinated me; I went home and immediately began writing this novel.

The gift to myself throughout this process was that I was able to write about Oe. While all of the other characters in
Dog Crazy
are fictional, Maggie's Toby is my Oe in nearly every way except name and breed. And though Toby's death propels Maggie down a path I've never taken, the huge love that she feels for her beloved dog is an experience I'm grateful to have had as well, and to share in these pages.

Dog Crazy shows how humor can still be found in times of sadness and struggle. Do you think it's important for people to hold on to their sense of humor when coping with something as difficult as losing a loved one?

Courtesy of the Author

Oe on the beach in California—memories of the day this photograph was taken served as inspiration for an important scene in
Dog Crazy.

I don't want to generalize, but I do think that laughter can be cathartic when dealing with the death of a dog. Humor is a key component of the dog-human bond; dogs' enthusiasm for life is sweet and charming and often—as anyone who has ever put a dab of peanut butter on her dog's nose can attest—hilarious. As we search for peace after loss, reminiscing about the funny, joyful moments we've shared with our pets can be both uplifting and insightful. Continuing to find the humor in life is one way to honor the spirit of a departed companion.

San Francisco is so vividly depicted in Dog Crazy that it really becomes a character in the book. Why did you decide to set the book there?

I live in San Francisco and am continually inspired by this city—its geography, architecture, culture, weather, and people. Setting the story here allowed me to funnel my observations of the city through the minds of my characters. But I didn't develop the story and then set it in San Francisco; those two actions were intertwined all along. The story developed the way it did because the characters live in this particular place, a city of heights and vistas, uniquely beautiful, dog-friendly parks, and smart, quirky, empathetic people. This was a San Francisco story from day one.

Who would you say is your dog's celebrity doppelgänger?

My husband and I adopted our dog, Cole, through an organization that finds homes in America for stray Taiwanese dogs.
How
we came to be hooked up with this particular organization is a story for another day, but suffice it to say, hooked we were. Cole was billed as a Taiwanese mountain dog (also known as a Formosan mountain dog) but it's pretty clear that there's a German shepherd and probably a few other dog breeds scattered throughout his family tree.

Courtesy of the Author

The point—I have one!—is that Cole is quite debonair. At seven years old he's been prematurely gray for years and his brow is appealingly furrowed. I'm sure you're glancing down the page now, studying the photograph at right, and wondering why on earth I've included a film still of George Clooney from the movie
The Descendants.
The answer, you'll be shocked to learn, is that
this is not a photograph of George Clooney
! It is a photograph of our dog, Cole. Wearing a Hawaiian shirt.

S
OMETIMES WE READ
to be transported into foreign emotional landscapes; other times we read for the pleasure and comfort of having the familiar illuminated. Dog books fall into the latter category for me. My favorite ones feel as though they were written by kindred spirits—dear friends with an enviable ability to articulate just how I feel. Each of the following books holds a special place in my heart, and has in one way or another inspired my own contribution to the genre.

by Wilson Rawls

This action-packed story of a boy and his faithful raccoon-hunting dogs, Dan and Ann, captured my imagination as a dog-crazy kid and has stayed with me ever since. In fact, thanks to this book I spent a chunk of my childhood pretending that our neighborhood park was the Ozarks and my dog was a coonhound. My fondness for the breed was later cemented at summer camp in Vermont, when I fell head over heels for the camp cook's dog, a coonhound named Gypsy. If YouTube had existed back then, Gypsy would have been famous; when you told her that you loved her, she responded with two short barks and one long howl—a crystal clear bark version of “
I love youuuuuuuuu
.”

by Anne Tyler

Macon Leary, grieving the tragic death of his young son and his subsequently dissolving marriage, is already at his wit's end when his dog, Edward, shows new signs of aggression. Enter one of my all-time favorite fictional characters: quirky, optimistic dog trainer Muriel Pritchett, the bright light of this poignant, funny, and steadily uplifting novel. I continually marvel at Tyler's ability to make the characters in this book wonderfully eccentric, painfully real, and entirely sympathetic.

by Jane O'Connor,
Illustrated by Robin Preiss Glasser

When you have three daughters under the age of six, you not only read a lot of Fancy Nancy books, you read them again and again . . . and again. Luckily, I'm always happy to dive into this sweet story of Nancy's quest for the perfect puppy. No matter how many times I read this book, I can't help but smile when Nancy, deciding that “unique” is even better than “fancy,” welcomes her new mixed-breed shelter pup with open arms. This one will always hold a place of honor in our family's library.

by Julie Klam

Do I adore this memoir or Julie Klam herself? It's a testament to Klam's irresistibly warm and funny voice that I honestly don't know the answer to that question. You'll laugh, you'll cry, and you'll hug your dogs a little tighter when you finish reading the exquisitely entertaining lessons the author has learned from rescuing Boston terriers. Julie Klam is a tremendous gift to dogs, dog lovers, and readers alike.

by Mary Oliver

Whether or not you typically read poetry, I can assure you that if you love dogs, you will love this remarkable book of autobiographical poems that—like all great dog books—is as much about living as it is about the dog-human bond. Oliver distills her wonderful observations into beautifully succinct turns of phrase that sink right into you, making this collection easy to read and yet impossible to forget. My copy is dog-eared, underlined, read and reread with great enjoyment, more than a few tears, and huge admiration for Oliver's heart and talent.

In Philadelphia, good girl Kate is dumped by her fiancé the day she learns she is pregnant with his child. In New York City, beautiful stay-at-home mom Vanessa finds herself obsessively searching the Internet for news of an old flame. And in San Francisco, Dani, an aspiring writer who can't seem to put down a book—or a cocktail—long enough to open her laptop, has just been fired . . . again.

In an effort to regroup, Kate, Vanessa, and Dani retreat to the New Jersey beach town where they once spent their summers. Emboldened by the seductive cadences of the shore, the women begin to realize just how much their lives, and friendships, have been shaped by the choices they made one fateful night on the beach eight years earlier—and by the secrets that now threaten to surface.

“
All the Summer Girls
is an honest and engaging look at the complicated and powerful bonds of female friendship. Donohue takes us on a weekend reunion full of secrets, resentment, and regret—in other words, once you start this book, you won't be able to put it down!”

—Jennifer Close, bestselling author of
Girls in White Dresses

Free-spirited Annie Quintana and sophisticated Julia St. Clair come from two different worlds. Yet, as the daughter of the St. Clairs' housekeeper, Annie grew up in Julia's San Francisco mansion and they forged a bond that only two little girls oblivious to class differences could—until a life-altering betrayal destroyed their friendship.

A decade later, Annie bakes to fill the void left in her heart by her mother's death, and a painful secret jeopardizes Julia's engagement to the man she loves. A chance reunion prompts the unlikely duo to open a cupcakery, but when a mysterious saboteur opens up old wounds, they must finally face the truth about their past or risk losing everything.

“A sparkling, witty story about an unlikely, yet redemptive, friendship. . . . Grab one of these for your best friend and read it together—preferably with a plate of Meyer lemon cupcakes nearby.”

—Katie Crouch, bestselling author of
Girls in Trucks
and
Men and Dogs

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hc.com
.