October 8, 2010 – Izzy and I kicked off the “Rose In A Storm” book tour at Northshire Books in Manchester, Vt., last night and drew an SRO crowd. Great questions, focusing on how a dog things, what I might say to inspire boys to write more (I said we should stop calling them stupid and dumping on their culture) and why did I leave urban life to go to a farm in Upstate, N.Y., and an “all-encompassing life with animals.” Great questions. I said I didn’t move to the farm for the love of animals, and that I didn’t write about animals from the perspective of an animal lover. As a writer, I find the emotional geography between people and animals fascinating and under-portrayed, and so it has been very fertile for me.

We talked about life with Rose, the structure of the novel, and I also mentioned that I have two books scheduled for publication – a collection of short stories called “Dancing Dogs,” and a book on grieving for animals called “Going Home: Help When Animals Die,” due out next Fall.

Izzy worked the crowd with his usual skill, focusing on blondes.

I loved the questions and the crowd – a different kind of crowd, I think – and we went for two hours. I am getting a handle on how to talk about this week and can’t wait to move further along on the tour. I’ll get my chance shortly. At 2 p.m. Sunday, we will be at Borders Books in Saratoga Springs. Then next week, I go to Washington and Northern Virginia, to Borders to do a signing and talk with Rita Mae Brown, which will be a great treat for me. We sold a bunch of Family Farm notecards, and thanks to Christine Nemec of Redux for coming. The “Judy” notecard series is in, and will be up on the Redux site shortly. I’m taking some of these cards on the tour. They sell for $16, to benefit family farms.