Tornado

As they wait out a tornado in the storm cellar, a family listens to the farm hand tell stories about a dog named Tornado he loved as a boy.

I loved writing this book because it gave me a chance to use some of the things my own dogs used to do. I had a dog named Sport who could do the same card trick that Tornado did in the book.

There was a red dog named Rudy who lived up the street. He came by one day, saw a nice bowl of water on our porch, took a drink and ended up, like Tornado, with a turtle in his mouth.

The cat in the book, Five-thirty, is a real cat and I dedicated the book to him and his family.