Mountain Dog (12 page)

If you do get lost, remember that many plants are poisonous. Only gobble wild berries if you recognize them as familiar—blackberries, strawberries, raspberries. Surprise: insects are some of the safest wild foods! If you're starving, try to think like a bear. They eat ant eggs, beetle grubs, grasshoppers, and crickets. (Never nibble spiders.)

If you're lost, don't panic. Stay in one place. Hug a tree. Every time you wander in circles, you make it harder for a four-footed trail angel to find you.

Trust the dog's nose.

 

A NOTE TO READERS

The characters in
Mountain Dog
are imaginary, but the story was inspired by a real boy, and real dogs. One of my husband's search-and-rescue dogs, Maggi, is a calm, wise Australian Shepherd/Queensland Heeler cross. Maggi came to us as a stray, needing to be rescued and adopted. She loves to herd humans, making sure we are all in one place. Our younger SAR dog, Chance, is an energetic Yellow Labrador Retriever who shares Gabe's enthusiasm for all things round and high-flying, even the moon.

When my husband trains Maggi and Chance, I serve as a volunteer “victim,” hiding in the forest so the dogs can practice finding a lost person. Sometimes I just hide for a few minutes, but there are days when I have to wait for hours before a dog's smart nose finds my invisible scent trail. It feels like magic, but my husband calls it science.

Many other aspects of
Mountain Dog
were also inspired by my real life. I have relatives who left our ancestral island on a raft. I've stood face-to-face with a bear on a trail, and I've heard a mountain lion's eerie cry. I've visited a sad, confused woman in prison. I've seen mountain areas remote enough to have tiny, old-fashioned schools, as well as cowboy churches where horses and dogs are welcome. I used to dread math, but in order to study botany and agriculture, I had to overcome my fear of numbers.

Most of all, throughout my life, whether on wilderness paths or city sidewalks, I have often received trail magic in the form of unexpected acts of kindness from strangers.

I hope you enjoy reading
Mountain Dog
as much as I enjoyed writing it!

 

YOUR FRIEND,

MARGARITA ENGLE

CLOVIS, CALIFORNIA

 

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I thank God for wilderness and trail angels.

I am joyfully grateful to Curtis, our dogs, the rest of our family, and the following canine search-and-rescue organizations: CARDA, MADSAR, SLOSAR, and NSDA. Special thanks to Kai Hernández, Norma Snelling, Nancy Acebo, and Dr. Cheryl Waterhouse.

I wish to express profound gratitude to Ann Martin and Laura Godwin for this opportunity to write about canine trail magic. Special thanks to Kate Butler, April Ward, and the entire Holt/Macmillan publishing team.

I am grateful to Olga and Alexey Ivanov for their beautiful illustrations.

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Margarita Engle
is a poet and novelist whose work has been published in many countries. Her books include
The Surrender Tree,
a Newbery Honor book and winner of the Jane Addams Children's Book Award, the Pura Belpré Award, the Américas Award, and the Claudia Lewis Poetry Award;
The Poet Slave of Cuba,
winner of the Pura Belpré Award and the Américas Award; and Hurricane Dancers, winner of the Pura Belpré Award.

 

ABOUT THE ILLUSTRATOR

Olga
and
Aleksey Ivanov
immigrated to the United States from Russia in 2002. The husband-and-wife team received a classical art education in Moscow and have collaborated on over eighty children's books, including
The Tall Book of Mother Goose
and
Charlotte's Web
. They live and work together in an artist studio near Denver, Colorado.

 

Text copyright © 2013 by Margarita Engle

Illustrations copyright © 2013 by Olga and Aleksey Ivanov

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The Library of Congress has catalogued the print edition as follows:

Engle, Margarita.

Mountain dog / Margarita Engle; illustrations by Olga and Aleksey Ivanov. — First edition.

pages       cm

ISBN 978-0-8050-9516-6 (hardcover)

  [1.  Novels in verse.  2.  Rescue dogs—Fiction.  3.  Dogs—Fiction.  4.  Human-animal relationships—Fiction.   5.  Great-uncles—Fiction.   6.  Foster home care—Fiction.   7.  Hispanic Americans—Fiction.   8.  Sierra Nevada (Calif. and Nev.)—Fiction.]   I.  Ivanov, O. (Olga), illustrator.   II.  Ivanov, A. (Aleksey), illustrator.   III.  Title.

PZ7.5.E54Mo 2013

[Fic]—dc23

2012027680

eISBN 9780805098938

First hardcover edition 2013

eBook edition August 2013