The “Dancing Dogs” book tour officially ended Friday in Wilmington, Vt., at Bartleby’s Books. Red came along to close the deal. It was a nice book tour and I suspect there will not be too many more as extensive, given publishing’s turn towards online marketing as the best and most efficient means of promoting books. I can’t disagree, although I love to get out and meet the people who read the blog and my books.

One of the neatest things about my book tours is that people I have known for years – followers of the blog, posters on Facebook – show up with smiles and good wishes, and it is just like meeting old friends. It is fascinating to put faces to comments and names. I thank all of you good people for showing up from Boston to Illinois to California and taking the trouble to meet me. On book tours, I learn just how important the blog has become to some people and how wide it’s reach is getting to be.

“Dancing Dogs” was very well received – some of my best reviews ever –  and is in its second printing, good for a short-story collection. Some people found the book to be sorrowful – I think it is  crammed with happy endings – but I think that is to be expected of a book that seeks to capture the real experience of living with dogs and other animals. “Dancing Dogs” is not “Boo, The Cutest Dog” and I am proud of that. My next book will be about Frieda and the role she played in bringing Maria and I together. That will be out in the fall of 2013. I will soon begin work on the Simon book, which, it seems will also include the story of Rocky and Red. I am  hoping to do  more e-books next year, perhaps even a collection of my writings on the blog. And I think e-books might be a good format for some of my photographs.

I thank all of you for the support you have given to my work and to “Dancing Dogs.” I have really enjoyed meeting with some of you, connecting in this very new kind of community. Thanks, thanks, thanks.