Here’s a fun idea for the month of June here at the Merry-Go-Round Blog Tour.  We’re talking about our favorite characters.  At first I groaned.  It’s a fun idea, and I’ve met a lot of characters through the years that lived on in my mind after I’d finished the book.  Holly Lisle can do that.  Shannon Stacey with her Kowalski series can do that.  Lois McMaster Bujold with her Miles Vorkosigan adventures is another who keeps a reader interested in characters.  I’m going to travel a little further back.  To a character I haven’t given much thought to in many years, but I’m going to say my favorite character is the dog (or dogs) in Dr. Seuss’ P. D. Eastman’s Go Dog. Go!

And I just discovered something.  All this time, I thought my favorite childhood book was a Dr. Seuss, but it’s by P. D. Eastman instead!  Looking through the similar books on Amazon, I’m surprised to learn a lot of my favorites I thought were written by Dr. Seuss were really written by other people!  In addition to Go Dog. Go!, I also loved Are You My Mother? (also by P. D. Eastman) and Put Me in the Zoo by Robert Lopshire.  I guess I wasn’t paying much attention to who wrote my favorite books as a pre-schooler back in the day.  The theme, of course, was the characters were animals, and I have always related to animals more than humans.

I think I’ve told this story before, but my mom and I were in an elevator together a couple of years ago.  I don’t remember where we were, but there were two posters in the elevator.  One of a baby in a stroller looking out with a big smile and another of (I think) a dachshund doing something.  My mom cooed over the baby in the stroller image, and I went ga-ga for the dachshund.  I think different people are wired differently.  I’ve developed a mild appreciation for human babies in recent years, but I wouldn’t call it an affection.  And it’s only come after Roxy, the stray cat we fostered for a few months, had kittens in the parlor (two of whom were Lady and Tarzan).  I was surprised by how maternal I felt toward them.

What about you?  Are you more drawn to human or animal babies?  Any idea why? (In my case, I’m baffled.)