I am such an animal lover and because I enjoy my own animals so much, I love to write them into my books and I love to read about them in other people's books. Animals can add a much needed lightness to a dark book, giving the reader a break from the heavy emotion and possibly bringing a smile. The crazy, natural things they do are just plain funny, and funny can and does happen at the worst of times. Make them laugh, make them cry, they say. Animals can help with both. Animals can reveal character. A hard-edged hero, showing affection to a dog or a horse, can tell the reader that he isn't quite as hard as he would have people believe. On the other hand, a man ignoring an animal or treating it badly can spell villlian without even saying so.

Animal behavior is unpredictable, which makes it a perfect vehicle for humor. It's also a natural way of creating humor, which I think works better than the contrived kind. I studied dog training books and applied some of their concepts in HEARTBREAK RANCH. Bella cautions her daughter in writing to go easy, that men and dogs were easily confused. She writes, "Keep the training lessons short. If you work with him too long, he'll become bored and won't respond at all. Never lose your temper. Yelling and stamping around in anger will only make things worse, and he'll be reluctant to respond to your training." These are real and natural responses for animals and they make simple statements about the characters that writers could otherwise spend reams of paper trying to make.

Memorable Animal Stories Books: