Shiny New Book! A Dog Named Jeopardy!
TADA!
It’s Book Six of Pet Trouble: Smarty-Pants Sheltie! And it’s available now! Actually, it’s been available all month and I totally neglected to tell you about it! Because I am LAME. But how AWESOME is this cover? I mean, serious cuteness, plus I love the colors, too.
Those of you who saw me on Jeopardy! last year might remember the chat I had with Alex Trebek about this book. See, after I auditioned for Jeopardy, I started writing this book about a really smart Shetland sheepdog, and so I thought to myself, "hey, Jeopardy would be a great name for this dog!" And I was halfway through writing the book when the call came for me to fly to LA to be on the show. SO EXCITING! (My hilarious editor suggested I name the next dog "Million Dollar Lottery Ticket" or "Free Trip To Paris.") 🙂
So if you’ve been waiting for it, now that book I mentioned on TV is finally in bookstores! :-) It stars a new sixth-grader called Noah (named after an extremely adorable one-year-old Noah I know) who’s just moved to town and wants to make friends, so his mom suggests that he should take his dog Jeopardy to an agility training class.
And guess who else is in the class? All the dogs from books 1-5! Yup: Parker and Merlin, Ella and Trumpet, Rosie/Danny and Buttons, Eric and Meatball, Rebekah and Noodles, and Heidi and Yeti are all a big part of this book, too. (But again, if you haven’t read the first five books, that’s OK! You can read this one without reading those first, if you want to.)
I wanted to write about agility training because Sunshine and I love going to agility classes. She’s a superstar on the obstacle course — running through tunnels, leaping over hurdles, and galloping across the see-saw! And we’ve often met Shelties in our classes who are wicked smart and so good at agility that they kind of want to just run off and do the course by themselves. It’s totally hilarious to watch, and I figured it would be fun to write about, too…so that’s where Jeopardy comes from!
Plus I got to describe how all the other dogs deal with the agility course as well, and those are all based on real dog reactions I’ve seen to the obstacles. Buttons, of course, does everything perfectly, just like a certain other small fluffy dog I know… 😉
I am an agility ninja! I bet New Puppy can’t dive through a tire or do the weave poles as well as I can! Ha!
Anyway, it was a lot of fun to write, and I hope you enjoy reading it! Yay shiny new book! :-) :-) 🙂
Oh, and while I’m here…Inevitable Baby Photo!:
Yes, that says "Captain Huggable"! I mean, seriously, who comes up with these outfits? And how can I get that job? 🙂
Hooray! I love wearing silly things! Which is good because right now I have no choice! Thanks a lot, Mom! I’m totally sure my eighth grade friends are never going to make fun of me for this! BTW, the first one who calls me Captain Huggable is getting eaten by a shark in my mom’s next book. I’m serious, don’t mess with me. I have connections.
Tragicomic dog story of the week: Poor Sunshine has this weird phobia of flies, so whenever one gets into the house she has a total panic attack and runs around trying to hide behind my legs or under the couch pillows. So last week, when a sinister fly invaded our house, Sunshine promptly went and hid under the baby’s crib. I think she was working on the assumption that we’ll do anything to protect New Puppy, so surely that must be the safest place in the house. Awwwww. Poor Snuggles!
Don’t worry, Original Puppy! I will save you!
And the other exciting news (brace yourselves) is that today Jonah rolled over…from his back onto his tummy! OMG! For the very first time! All by himself! OMG! :-) OK, this may not sound exciting to many of you, but it is actually QUITE difficult, especially for a tiny little person not yet four months old, whose arms don’t always do exactly what he wants them to do.
But he’s very very determined. He’s pretty sure he’s, like, nanoseconds away from crawling, at least if he has anything to say about it (mostly what he has to say is "Ah-GOO!" and "Mmmmmooog." Interpret as you will.) 😉
I’m coming for that camera…just you wait!
Happy Memorial Day weekend, everybody! I hope you’re all getting lots of rest and staying cool and having fun! :-) More soon, once I have photos to share of the tremendously amazing school & students I visited this week… 🙂
Quote of the Day: "Story of my life. My cuteness interferes with people hearing my message." — Lily, How I Met Your Mother