Trixie, Anna and Elsa's Dad (aka Author Dean Koontz)

0:00Hey, Pablo Torre here. As a sports journalist, I've covered global sports for many years now. And there is one thing that I can promise you. Nothing compares to the World Cup. And this time it is even better thanks to McDonald's. You have the chance to take home one of nine legendary cups when you order the FIFA World Cup meal. The cups feature some of the biggest legends in football like David Beckham, Terry Henry and Ronaldinho, Christian Pulisic, Laminya Mall and Alfonso Davies. Right now, get one of nine legendary cups when you order the FIFA World Cup meal only at McDonald's. At participating McDonald's, only for a limited time, while supplies last.

0:36All rights reserved. Copyright 2026. McDonald's at the FIFA World Cup 2026.

0:43Dean Koontz: Host unforgettable backyard barbecues with savings from Whole Foods Market. Get the good times going with made-in-house chicken or pork sausages and ready-to-cook kebabs for hassle-free flavor. Grab tasty flatbreads and their new balsamic chicken salad in the prepared foods department. Keep things fresh with organic red cherries, strawberries, and peaches at their peak. And stock up on bug sprays and sun care must-haves. Make your summer sizzle at Whole Foods Market. Here's a tip for you. There's a podcast out there with fans waiting to be your next customer. They tune in every week, they trust the host, and that host wants to talk about brands like yours in their own words to their audience.

1:25The problem is, you just haven't been introduced yet. We're Acast, where that introduction happens. As the world's largest podcast marketplace, we let you browse shows, see who's listening, and book host-read sponsorships or run your own ads all from one platform. Transparent pricing, real-time data, complete control. Start advertising on podcasts by visiting acast.com slash advertise. She would come in at five o 'clock and throw my hand off the keyboard. And I stopped at that time working past five o 'clock and never did again. Wow. That alone was an amazing life-changing thing. I'm Jen Morose, and this is Verbal Confidential.

2:15Dean Kuntz has sold more than 500 million books worldwide. They're mostly suspense thrillers. They have scary covers and titles like The Bad Place and Mr. Murder. But on the inside cover of many of them, including his latest, Going Home in the Dark, you'll see a friendly photo of Dean beside a beautiful golden retriever. And they're both smiling. Dean was well into midlife and deep into his writing career when he adopted his first golden, Trixie. And she changed everything. So much so that he wrote a memoir about their time together called A Big Little Life. It's such a beautiful read. Dean also co-authored several other books with Trixie and with Anna, who came after Trixie.

2:59And now Dean has Elsa, who, spoiler alert, is not much of a writer. Dean's dogs have all had distinct personalities, but they also share a lot in common. They're all golden retrievers. They're all related. And they all came to Dean and his wife, Jerta, through an organization they adore, Canine Companions for Independence, or CCI. They provide service dogs to adults, children, and veterans with disabilities. But not all the dogs make it through the rigorous training program, which means some are released for adoption to the public, or, say, to a world-famous best-selling author. Dogs pop up in a lot of Dean's books, and they did even before he got Trixie.

3:41I remember reading Dean's 1987 book Watchers, which features a golden retriever, a very smart one. And I wondered whether he was writing what he knew at that point or was he perhaps manifesting some future dog?

4:00So I always had liked dogs and I often thought about them. And when I wrote Watchers, no, I hadn't had one, But I was still thinking about it. Then we got to work with canine companions for many years. And they kept asking us to take a release dog, one that didn't finish its training for whatever reason. And we kept turning them down. And I finally one day said to my wife, we got to say yes. We kept saying we're too busy, we're too busy. And I said, if we don't say yes, we're going to be 90 years old and it'll be too late to say yes. So that's when we took Trixie and it became this marvelous experience.

4:42So I don't know, this fascination with dogs was always there, but it was well past middle age before I finally had one in the family. And so when Trixie came to you, she had gone through all of that training to be a help to somebody. Is that right? Yes, and she had actually been in service with a young lady who lost her legs in a traffic accident. And after, I think it was six months, Trixie developed an elbow problem, had had surgery. And after that, she couldn't continue as a service dog because she wouldn't have had the necessary strength in case in an emergency she had to pull the wheelchair.

5:31So they were looking for her home and she came to us. and it transformed our lives. As I began to say, when we would always take her out with us or nearly always when we went out to dinner, we'd eat only at restaurants that had dogs on the patio. And people would come over as they did with all three of her dogs and say, your dog is so well behaved. I always let them think we did that. I didn't reveal these two my companions, but I always said, yes, she's better behaved than I am. And that was the truth, actually. You know, you mentioned that Trixie came into your life and very quickly transformed yours and Jerta's world.

6:21How did it transform and how quickly? I was, I've always been something of a workaholic. Dean has written more than 100 books. Think about that. 100 books. And sold more than 500 million copies worldwide. So when he says workaholic, he really means it. In those days when Trixie came into the family, I would delay dinner until 7, 8 o 'clock so I could work that late. And on her first day in our house She came down the hall It was a very sprawling large house And she came down to the wing that was jurders in my office And she came into my office Padded in exactly at 5 o 'clock And came around the corner desk and looked at me Just stared at me And I said, just a little while She said, go to bed, go to bed And she padded back out of the office And didn't go to bed came back in at like 5 10 looked around the desk and at 5 15 how she knew of the time but I swear I didn't know she did she came over to me and I was typing and I smiled at her and she put her nose under my arm and threw my hand off the typewriter very subtle hint for dinner very subtle I thought that was funny and I stroked her and patted her a little and then I went back to typing and she did it again and over the next five days she showed up at five and and stopped waiting for 10 minutes she would come in at five o 'clock and throw my hand off the keyboard and for that i stopped at that time working past five o 'clock and never did again uh and it was it was uh an amazing life that alone was an amazing life-changing thing and my wife her Her talent is with numbers.

8:22Mine is with words. So she, her background's accounting. So she takes care of all things dealing with money or numbers that we deal with. And she would work the same hours I would. But when I quit, then Trixie would go to work on her. Pretty soon, we were both stopping at five o 'clock. And that was just the one of many, the exercise I did was in a home gym. and I never went for walks, but Trixie changed that. And she was a walking dog. She loved to walk. She would go for hours if you let her. And Jerdie would walk her for a couple of hours and they'd go miles and miles before they got home. I couldn't put in that time, but she got both of us in better health than I think we were otherwise.

9:14There were all those other changes that dogs do for you and the things they teach you that are so life-enhancing is to take every day as it comes. One thing I was fascinated with on the walks is dogs are fascinated with everything. They often look at the same thing they've looked at 100 ,000 times before. They're smelling, they sense smell, intrigues, and what things you don't even see. And one thing that happened on the walk is It was through a neighborhood, around streets. I thought I knew by heart. But when you walk it with the dog, you suddenly start seeing things you never saw before because the dog makes you take the time in that walk to see them.

10:00So she increased my powers of observance, I think. Trixie had her own powers of observance, too. Dean says she had a mystical side and could see things that humans just couldn't. It strikes me that so many people, and this comes up a lot in the book, but so many people described Trixie as special, as well as stoic, but as special. And one story of an elderly man stopping you on the street and saying, essentially, that she's, you can finish the story. Yes, it was a neighbor that we saw on walks. He was an elderly Indian man from India. And he had a walker, but he walked a long time every day with that walker.

10:53And he was so charming. My wife and I, when we walked separately, got together, would always stop and talk to him. And we'd seen him for probably a year or more than that. And one day I was out walking at Trixie on a weekend, and I was bringing her back home and encountered this gentleman. And he stopped me, and we were talking, and he looked at her and looked at me, and he said, do you know what your dog is? And I said, oh, I thought he meant breed. I said, oh, yes, she's a golden retriever. And he said, no, that's not what I'm talking about. And then he proceeded to tell me that in his faith, which was Hinduism, that there is a belief that when somebody has returned to earth often enough that they have finally lived, how did he say this, a faultless life, that the last time they're here, they will come back one more time to be a beautiful dog and then go on to nirvana.

11:57And I was like, whoa. And he said, so it's been put to you to take care of a perfect soul on the last visit to Earth. Wow. Okay. How have I screwed up so far? Because I don't want to screw up if this is a perfect soul on his way to paradise. But did that put any pressure on you to be the caretaker of this perfect soul? No, I just walked on home and said to Trixie, you see, this is why I pick up your poop. You're a perfect soul. And I recognize that. So therefore, I will stoop to pick up your poop. I will do anything. Trixie lived a wonderful life with Dean and Jerta. She died in the summer of 2007.

12:56But remember that mystical side of her that we talked about earlier? Here's the rest of the story. Both Jira and I were having tremendous problems with grief. And Jira was in a position saying, I can never have another dog because I can't go through this. And I said, oh, one day we will. It'll just take time. and so every day at the time Chixia passed, I would find Shirley. We'd just walk around. The property was two and a half acres. We're all kind of places where we had memories of the dogs, so we would walk around. Just a few weeks later, on the same day, at the same hour, we were walking and this butterfly, bigger than my hand, beautiful golden butterfly, came down out of the trees on this one side of her lawn and just fluttered around our faces.

13:57And normally your reaction would be, and both of us just stood and let that happen, kind of amazed at the size and beauty of this thing and then it went back up into the trees and the we went a little ways further before jurgis said was that turkey and i said yeah i think it was uh and i've since had uh all kind of mail from people who go on about the uh manifestation i guess of butterflies yeah Not just at August, but sometimes at the hour a love phone passed. So who knows? But I became convinced that was just a way of saying, it's okay. I'm still someplace else that you can do this again. It took me about six months to be able to do it again.

14:59It took two months more than that. Then Anna came into her lives. And then Anna passed when she was 10. Unlike Trixie, Anna had failed out of the training. She got through 20 weeks or so. And we no longer say, canine companions, that they failed out. We say they had a career change. and her problem was that they couldn't break her from being distracted by birds if she was the fastest creature i've ever seen we had a big backyard and i could stand in the middle of it while she went into one of those gotta run kind of zoomies and she would run around the perimeter at the lawn so fast that me standing in the center, turning in place, couldn't keep her in sight.

15:56She was moving faster on the perimeter than I could move in one little spot. And I wrote that to them in a letter and they came back and they were laughing, said, we agree that we've never seen an animal as fast as she is. And then after her came Elsa and Elsa also had a career change at 21 months because, as they put it, we had lost Anna only two weeks previous. Oh, wow. And we weren't ready. And then some people from CCI came up for lunch, and we were sitting in the living room talking, and Barbara, the woman who manages the campus nearest us, said, we have another their dog that has a career change needs a home.

16:46And I know you're not ready. And I know you just lost Anna. And Jerta said, no, no, I'm not going to be ready for a long time. And I said, me too. And Barbara held up her cell phone and said, this is her picture. Oh, she was playing dirty. Yeah, it was impossible to say no. But she said, Elsa's problem is that she doesn't want to work. she wants to cuddle. Oh, okay. That's about perfect. And she has turned out to be the most cuddling dog. She wants to just hang with you and be with you being stroked almost all day long. Sometimes you have to say, go to bed. Got to get some work done here. You've got to get work done, but it can't help but give her 15 minutes or so every time she shows an interest in it.

17:39But yeah, they've all been different personalities. It's interesting. People who don't have dogs, I don't think quite understand or don't know dogs, don't quite understand how different they are and what peculiarities they might have. Mine has a ton of them too. And generally speaking, they're not bad personality differences. They're simply different amusing personality differences, but they're as different from one another as people are, except all three of our Goldens have had all that wonderful golden person. Part of that personality is that wonderful way Goldens are and that golden grin that you can't resist.

18:24And they came with varying degrees of that training from CCI. Yeah, that's, we can't take any credit for the fact that they're so well behaved when these come out. But when people compliment. You won't tell anyone. No, we always assume, you know, we let them think, yes, we're just brilliant at this. Dean's dogs have all been well trained and well behaved and truly smart. And one thing that really stood out to Dean was how quickly they could learn words. One night when we took Trixie out to dinner, the only thing she ever got from our table is we'd order her just a simple cooked chicken breast and then we cut it up and give it to her.

19:11But this one night we were in a restaurant and we didn't see anything in the menu. And she said, you want to be this really crazy because we're always careful. It's just we're a big plate of nachos because they're good here. and we never allow ourselves that kind of thing. So we said, yes, we got one. And I gave Trixie a corn chip with some cheese on it, made sure that it wasn't hot sauce on it, little avocado on it and stuff. I just gave her two pieces like that. And then a few months later, we did the same thing. And I gave her some more nachos. Time passed, some more months. And we were, I was in the office of, at that time, my two assistants, Linda, who is still here right now, and Elaine.

19:59And Elaine was talking about restaurants. I guess we all were. And I said, oh, you know a place you can get really good nachos and a third of nachos? Trixie was lying in her bed. She jumped up like a shot and came running over and was looking like this. And I said, my God, twice she had some nachos. And all these months later, she still connects that word to that taste. That's amazing. And at some point, I figured that a service dog will have a few hundred words of knowledge because of all the commands they have now. but I think by the time Trixie passed she probably knew at least 500 words and that's something when they tell people they go no dogs can't learn that many words yes they can it depends on how they're treated how they're handled and how they're encouraged Bonnie Bergen who founded the idea of assistance dogs actually wrote a book called Teach Your Dog to Read do and what she did was tell you one of these dogs that has all these words in their command base and she put them on flashcards uh sit bark and everything and uh by the time she got done training the dog she'll look at the flashcard the dog will look at it and do what it said now there's some people say it's pattern recognition well that's what reading is It's pattern recognition.

21:37You read the pattern of the word, and that's how you get it. So I don't see how you don't call that teaching your dog to read. I feel like I need to get that book for clutch. I may very well say, Bonnie once said, she thought you could teach a dog to do just about anything. Now, not to build a spaceship, but a lot more. We got enough people doing that. Yeah, I think so.

22:08you've gone through beautifully like how different each of these dogs um has been in your life um what what have they collectively taught taught you as a person as a dog dad um and and jrda too because i know she has been equally touched and transformed by having Trixie and Anna and Elsa in your lives? I think one of the bigger things was patience. I've always been go, do, get it done, move forward. This has to be done. That has to be done. And I could get so frustrated with my writing at times because I'm somewhat of an obsessive compulsive about the English language. And it can be that I'll be so unsatisfied with how it's coming out that I will get blocked, not blocked, because I've never been blocked, but I'll get slowed down simply because I get so frustrated that I'm not able to resolve this scene the way I want.

23:17And I'll put myself, or I used to put myself in such a mood that I wouldn't sleep well that night or sometimes at all. And it was all from that impatience that this has to get done. and one thing I learned from a dog is it'll be there tomorrow yeah and the only thing that you're doing by being impatient about it is making it take longer because your impatience slows you down that was something I definitely learned from the first dog and that's something they all have their sense of time they have a sense of time now they always at least everyone we've had has known when it's time for dinner and comes to you about five minutes before and stands staring at you, if not even before that.

24:09And nothing stops them staring at you until you've got the food. Until you deliver. Yeah. Something that I know some of your super fans will probably know about, but something that others might not know is aside from A Big Little Life, which is more your memoir and your voice, you've also co-written books with Anna and Trixie. And I don't think Elsa yet, but you've co-written blog entries with Elsa. What made you decide to write from the point of view of a dog? Well, I wouldn't have thought we'd be able to even sell a book such as was proposed. But There was this editor at Random House. She edited omnibus books where they collect three of an author's books in one big volume.

25:03She ran that division. Her name is Kate. And I like Kate. We stayed in touch. And then one day she called me and said, I've left Random House. I've got some backing to start a little publishing house of my own. I wanted to do a book with you and Trixie. And I said, what kind of book? And she said, you tell me what kind of book. But something that features a lot of photographs of Trixie and so forth. So I came up with a book called Life is Good. And I say it left me in a state of jealous rage when Trixie's first book sold 75 ,000 hardcovers and my first book sold 5 ,000 hardcovers. Oh, dear. So for a while, you know, it's just.

25:58You were a little sore? Yeah, I was thinking about a cat. And it was so much fun. And we did a book, Trixie's After Trixie had passed. It was called Bliss to You. And it was a little gift book. It did very well. It was published by Hyperion. And that book is just a dog walking you through all the things you could learn to live a happier life if he just had the sense of the dog. And she comes up with it. It's an Invelace dog. And I've had people tell me how important that book was to them at a certain point, including a doctor who's been important in my life. It was a lot of fun doing this. But at a certain point, you know, then we got Elsa and all these dog authors in our family.

26:53And Elsa made that clear right up front. No books. Okay. I'm not writing books. She was putting her paw down. Yeah, she doesn't mind reading them, but she wasn't going to write one. Just because dad writes doesn't mean I have to write. She's doing macromains. Okay. I actually want to pick up on just one thing that you mentioned in the Ask Anna book that a lot of people found it really helpful to see. I don't know things through the eyes of of a dog and how what what seeing things through the eyes of a dog could maybe do for us as humans like in this moment that we're in in the world um or any you know tough moment it what lessons could we as like humans derive from dogs do you think as long as I've been in the world it's always been a bad moment there's always war, there's always this there's always that and dogs dogs don't worry anything I worry about if it's past the food time and you haven't put it in a bowl yet and I've realized all my life I've worried to excess about things and i think there you come to a point when you learn a lesson from a dog is the things you can't control which is most everything uh there's no point in worrying about it you do your best and you move on and i still worry more than i should about the state to the world or this or that.

28:40But to worry to excess, where it becomes inhibiting in your life to your happiness, to your sense of the goodness of the world and life and people, it's time to stop worrying about it. It's time to take the dog attitude. I don't control this. And therefore, I'm going to say I hope the right thing happens. I know that the right thing is. but it's nothing I can deal with. And so I can do what little I can do to be kind to other people and maybe make the world a better place that way. But other than that, don't worry about it. What will happen, will happen. And I think that's the best lesson maybe anybody can get because it settles you down.

29:30It does, it does. And that's beautiful. And I think that's a beautiful point for us to end this conversation on. Thank you so much for taking the time today and sharing all these wonderful stories. Well, thanks for having me. The time went very quickly for me.

29:53Thanks so much to Dean Kuntz for that conversation. You can find his books pretty much everywhere. His latest is called Going Home in the Dark. And if you want to cry your head off, check out his memoir about Trixie, A Big Little Life. We asked Dean for a favourite pet-related cause, and at this point, I don't think you're going to be surprised to know that he said canine companions for independence. Dean gives all of the money from his dog-related books to them. He's been such a generous supporter of that organisation over the years that CCI named one of their campuses after his family. It was called the Dean and Charlie Prince campus, and we didn't ask for it to be named.

30:31They did it without telling us as a surprise, and we didn't want to have to rip down the monument sign from them. But after Trixie passed, I asked them, hey, if you ever redo that sign, could you add her name to the name of the campus? And they did. So it's been a good experience. Wonderful. The Dean and Jerta and Trixie Kuntz campus. I love it. You can find CCI at canine.org and we'll link to them in the show notes too. That's another episode of Furball Confidential in the books. And if this show is barking up the right tree for you, make sure you follow us so you don't miss an episode and help us spread the word so we can make some more.

31:17Furball Confidential is created and hosted by me, Jen Morose. Our producer is Talia Schlanger. She and David Travers-Smith co-created our theme music with Brian Kobayakawa on bass. Video and sound design and editing are all done by Reza Daya. Danny Stover does our social media. Our show artwork is by Adrian Foro. And on audience development, we have Marina Hanna. And thanks, as always, to the original inspiration for this podcast, Clutch. I'm Jen Moroz. See you next time on Furball Confidential.

32:00Hey, Pablo Torre here. As a sports journalist, I've covered global sports for many years now. And there is one thing that I can promise you. Nothing compares to the World Cup. And this time it is even better thanks to McDonald's. You have the chance to take home one of nine legendary cups when you order the FIFA World Cup meal. The cups feature some of the biggest legends in football, like David Beckham, Terry Henry, and Ronaldinho, Christian Pulisic, Lamin Yamal, and Alfonso Davies. Right now, get one of nine legendary cups when you order the FIFA World Cup meal only at McDonald's. At participating McDonald's, only for a limited time, while supplies last, all rights reserved, copyright 2026, McDonald's at the FIFA World Cup 2026.

32:42Do you keep hearing podcast ads, like this one, for example, but always wonder how you actually get involved with them for your own brand or organization? Well, it's easier than you think. We're Acast, and we give you the platform to do it all yourself. Browse thousands of popular podcasts, choose the shows that match your perfect audience, set your budget, and launch. And if you want a hand, our podcast specialists are there to help you launch with confidence. This is podcast advertising without barriers. Get started at acast.com slash advertise.