"I got home last night and my dear lab Baci had torn into my new copy of Caleb Carr's The Italian Secretary," says Angela Baggetta Hayes, the deputy director of publicity at Goldberg McDuffie. "Is she trying to tell me something?" You can sorta make it out the little bits of torn paper around the book, if you look carefully enough!

We also heard from novelist Whitney Gaskell about her pug, Lulu (above). "What she lacks in brains and the ability to master simple potty training, she makes up for in sparkling personality," Gaskell writes. "Well, that and the ability to down whole grilled cheese sandwiches in a single gulp. It's pure talent."

And then there's the email we got from Bothwell (below) about life with her mamma, author Ysabeau S. Wilce. "Every morning I herd my mamma into her office, and I sit under her desk ALL DAY long to make sure that she is WRITING," Bothwell told us, "tho' I do allow occasional coffee/dog-treat breaks. In the evening, I herd her outside and escort her on a very long walk—writers do need exercise you know—and then it's back to the desk for more WRITING. Herding writers is harder than herding sheep, for sheep are not constantly wont to wander off to watch Law & Order re-runs, drink so much coffee they vibrate, or cry like babies when they can't figure out how to end chapter sixteen." Bothwell's guidance must have paid off; Wilce's Flora Segunda comes out next winter.