CHAPTER 1:
“REMEMBERING”
The Journey of a Poor (but Cute) Puppy Who Lived Long Ago (and Was Also an Orphan)
By Howie Monroe & Delilah Gorbish
CHAPTER 1:
“REMEMBERING”
Howie Monroe, a lonely puppy who had no home, gazed sadly at his reflection in the pond. It was a hot summer day long ago when people (and puppies) were poor and the air was full of dust and yearning. Howie, seeing his haggard, yet strong and incredibly handsome, face, yearned for a chicken bone.
“That’s all I ask,” Howie said to no one but the swirling dust and rippling water, “just a chicken bone with maybe a little meat on it to give me strength for my journey.”
He thought back to how his journey had begun. It had been only days, yet it felt like years.
He had been happy once, but that was before the story started. Now he needed to be sad so whoever gave out the Newbony Award would take him seriously. He remembered frolicking with his brothers and sisters on the back forty behind the little house on the prairie where they lived with Ma and Pa Monroe and their sons, Peter and Tobias. Cows mooed contentedly about them, as lambs wobbled on their spindly legs.
“Be careful not to knock over any of the lambs wobbling on their spindly legs,” Howie’s mother advised him. She was wise and smart, just as Howie would grow up to be.
“I’ll be careful, Mother,” the sweet and affectionate Howie replied.
Howie rolled over in the clover, sniffing the sweet summer air. Suddenly he sniffed something that made him worry. Was it . . . could it be . . . ?
Yes! There was a change in the air. The cows stopped their mooing. The lambs stopped their wobbling. The puppies stopped their frolicking.
“Run!” Howie’s mother cried out in alarm. “It’s a tornado!”
Howie didn’t have time to wonder where his father was. He figured he probably wasn’t in the story at all, since most characters in Newbony books didn’t have a father. Or a mother. Or both.
Ma and Pa Monroe were running toward them, desperate to save the animals who . . . whom . . . who . . . whom they loved as much as their own sons.
