Dog Talk ® (and Kitties Too!)

#855A: Grant Hayter-Menzies talks about his memoir “Freddie: The Rescue Dog Who Rescued Me” and how their two-way street of unconditional love got them both through the tough times.

#855B: Dr. Deborah Aronson is a veterinarian who is an end-of-life specialist, offering in home euthanasia and also professionally trained in pastoral care so she can tend to the emotional needs of her human patients while consulting on palliative care for “silver whiskered patients.” 

#855C: Sassafras Lowrey’s piece in the New York Times “What We Can Learn from European Dog Culture” makes some interesting points about cultural differences seen through a canine lens.

#855A: Ethologist Jessica Pierce’s new book “Who's a Good Dog? How to Be a Better Human” exhorts us to meet a dog where they stand. Accept them for who they are — appreciate the neuro-diversities of dogs as we now do with children. 

#855B: Tracie talks to trainer Annie Phenix — author of “Positive Reinforcement for Aggressive and Reactive Dogs” — about dog-on-dog attacks and the horror of a pack of German Shepherds kept by a bookstore owner on the Upper East Side of New York, who allowed her dogs to terrorize small dogs and finally to kill one.

#855C: Bob Bryant Mission discusses his K9 Rescue that rehabilitates, repatriates and [when appropriate] finds homes with former military K9 handlers for MWDs whose military service has ended.

#853A: From England, Sarah Brown talks about her newest book “The Hidden Language of Cats: How They Have us at Meow” and how cats actually only meow to people, not other cats!

#853B: Nationally acclaimed pet nutrition expert Ryan Yamka debunks myths about pet foods — particularly that “senior” foods and “keto diets” have no basis in nutrition science, says the man who in 2020 won the Pet Science Pet Industry Disruptor Award.

#853C: Kate Foster in Australia discusses how she and her son are both autistic, which inspired her to write “All the Small Wonderful Things.”

#852A: Widely respected political author and columnist Matt Bai talks about his recent opinion piece in the Washington Post entitled "Master and Commander: Biden's Dog Troubles Hint at a Larger Problem," about the multiple uncontrolled biting attacks by Biden's German Shepherd Commander, which Tracie views as irresponsible and immoral dog ownership and which Bai views as the danger and seduction of entitlement that can come with sitting in the Oval Office. 

#852B: Wendy Wen talks about being a woman entrepreneur in the pet industry, carefully buying brands like Bocce's Bakery, Ark Naturals, and Super Snouts to infuse them with venture capital and help them grow to the next level, while retaining the original founders and team behind those companies.

#851A: Pilley Bianchi talks about her book "For the Love of Dog" and growing up as the "sibling" of the world's most brilliant dog — Chaser — who knew over 1,000 words. She encourages everyone to "use their dogs' brilliant minds to play," and magnify our bond and appreciation of them.

#851B: Peta Hitchens in Australia talks about her movie "Filming Dogs" that will be in the upcoming 8th Annual NY Dog Film Festival, and the question she asks herself and others who have performing dogs: "Do they really want to be doing this or are you doing it for yourself?"

 #850C: Lynn Hightower, the author of the thriller “A Beautiful Risk” — which is also a book about loss and grief — talks about how this book morphed into her column on grief for Psychology Today. [She generously bought copies of her book for the doggy swag bags for the filmmakers coming to the NYC premiere of the 8th Annual NY Dog Film Festival.] 

 #850B: Francesco Marciuliano has written “Oh. It’s You. Love Poems by Cats,” another hilarious collection of poems inspired by (and theoretically penned by) his own cultured kitties. He is giving a copy as a gift to everyone who buys tickets for the Meow Party, as well as to the filmmakers coming to the 6th Annual NY Cat Film Festival premiere. 

 #850A: Cate Conte is back with another cozy kitty-infused mystery, this time with ghosts, a psychic, and deaths in a haunted house on Halloween. 

#849A: Director Kim Best won the first-ever Visionary Award in 2022 for having had a film (and sometimes two!) in every NY Cat Film Festival since the first year. She talks about yet again having two of her films selected for this year’s 6th Annual Festival —  “Insomnia” and “Seen at Last” — and what inspires her.

#849B: Brian Patrick Duggan talks about his innovative new book, “Horror Dogs: Man’s Best Friend as Movie Monster,” and the years of research and passion that went into unearthing all the movies ever made in which dogs are depicted as you’ve never thought of them before: as “man’s scariest” friend.

#849C: Kathleen Donnelly talks about her second book in the National Forest K-9 series and how her own experience with search dogs makes the human-canine bond so realistic (and the danger so scarier!)

#848A: Hersch Wilson discusses the special ways that living alongside dogs can expand our view of the universe in his book “Dog Lessons: Learning the Important Stuff from Our Best Friends.”