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A Big Little Life

A Big Little Life

Titel: A Big Little Life Kostenlos Bücher Online Lesen
Autoren: Dean Koontz
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and she wished to be treated as one. Even when watching a movie, I was expected to properly revere her.
    I learned not to sit on that family-room floor in my bare feet. If Trixie thought I had gotten too interested in whatever was on the screen and that I was giving her less attention than she deserved, she slipped out from under my massaging hand and went to my feet to lick my toes and distract me from the movie. The first time she tried this, I was determined to tough it out, imagining that she would stop the tickling if I didn’t laugh, if I remained intent on the screen. Judging by how quickly she reduced me to giggling hysteria, I would not long resist spilling my guts if waterboarded.
     
    LASSIE IS MORE famous than Trixie, but I must note that Lassie never wrote a book, whereas Trixie has now written three for adults and two for children. So there.
    Kate Hartson, Trixie’s first publisher, likes dogs. She is nuts about dogs. As far as I can tell, she knows nothing about current events, and I suspect that if she caught a TV news report that Earth was on a collision course with a massive asteroid, she would say, “Yeah, all right, I’ll worry about that later, right now it’s time to run on the beach with the dogs!” She talks more about her dogs than she does about her husband, Bill, and he doesn’t seem to mind.“The dogs are more interesting than I am,” he once said. They have had a series of stunningly beautiful German shepherds bred and trained by the Monks of New Skete.
    At one time, I worked with Kate when she was at Random House. She is charming, enthusiastic, and always full of ideas for new ways of publishing. Eventually she founded Yorkville Press, and while casting around for books to publish, she contacted me to ask if I had any ideas. I suggested a volume on Canine Companions for Independence and introduced Kate to the folks at the Oceanside campus. Eventually she published a beautiful book on CCI, Love Heels , that included a couple of hundred wonderful full-color photographs, and I wrote a foreword for the project.
    With my encouragement, Trixie had been writing pieces for our snail-mail newsletter and Web site. Kate saw these and suggested that we do a book by Trix, with lots of photographs, with her humorous observations about life, in her doggy voice. Following is one of the pieces that inspired Kate to think Trixie could be a successful author.
    My Summer
by Trixie Koontz, Dog
    Dad teaches me to type. Hold pencil in mouth and type. At first is fun. Then is not fun. He says to me, “Write, Trixie, write. Write essay for Web site.” Being good dog, I write. Not fun, but I write. Expect treatfor writing. Get no treat. Stop writing. Get treat. Carob biscuit. Good, good, good. Okay, so I write some more.
    Dad promises Web site visitors my essay end of July. Must give up important ball chasing, important napping, important sniffing—all to write. Work hard. Writing hard. So many words. Stupid punctuation rules. Hate semicolons. Hate; hate; hate. Chew up many pencils in frustration.
    Finish article. Give to Dad. Then I rip guts out of duck. Duck is not real. Is Booda duck, stuffed toy. I am gentle dog. Cannot hurt real duck or even cat. But am hell on stuffed toys. Work off tension. Rip, rip, rip. Feel pretty good. Cough up soggy wad of Booda-duck stuffing. Feel even better.
    Dad gives editorial suggestions. Stupid suggestions.
    Stupid, stupid, stupid! He is not editor, is writer. Like me, Trixie Koontz, who is dog. I pretend to listen.
    Am actually thinking about bacon. Bacon is good. Bacon is very good. I am good, too. People call me “good dog, good, very good.” Bacon is very good. I am very good. But I am not bacon. Why not? Mysterious.
    Then I think about cats. What is wrong with them? Who do they think they are? What do they want? Who invented them, anyway? Not God, surely. Maybe Satan? So nervous writing about cats, I use too manyitalics. Then I hit hateful semicolon key; don’t know why; but I do it again; and whimper.
    Dogs are not born to write essays. Maybe fiction. Maybe poetry. Not essays. Maybe advertising copy.
    Here is my advertising copy: BACON IS VERY GOOD. BUY BACON. BUY LOTS OF BACON. GIVE TO ME. THANK YOU.
    Dad gives me editorial notes for study. Eight pages. I pee on them. He gets message.
    Dad says will give my essay to webmaster as is. Webmaster is nice person, nice. She will know good writing when she sees it.
    Days pass. Weeks. Chase ball. Chase rabbits.

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