Marley & Me Author John Grogan on Why Dogs Are, Well, So Cool

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Joan Oleck -- School Library Journal, 7/18/2007

Marley & Me (HarperCollins, 2005), John Grogan's memoir about his family's big, neurotic Labrador retriever, spent an impressive 61 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list. Now his adapted picture book for children, Bad Dog, Marley! and Marley: A Dog Like No Other (both HarperCollins, 2007), for middle-schoolers, have also attained best-selling status. 

SLJ spoke with Grogan from his Pennsylvania home about his decision to "cross over" to the kids' literary aisle and what it is about canines that draws us in the first place.

How'd you come to write the adult Marley book?
He was this bigger-than-life, crazy, exuberant dog who was always getting into these situations that were very embarrassing to us but also very funny. And I started telling these stories at dinner parties and whatnot and they were hugely [popular]. People would always be asking me, "So what's the latest with the big wild dog?"

Whose idea was it to "cross over" with the story for kids?
I have a 10-year-old daughter, and I don't think she's ready to read a book that talks about her parents' sex life and about [my wife's] miscarriage and our attempts at procreation. So I started thinking "maybe I should have an adapted version of Marley & Me that's toned down for kids." [My agent] said, "I've really been thinking about it, too." So together we came up with the whole Bad Dog, Marley! concept for the picture book and an adaptation for middle school.

What were some of the major changes?
Harper Children's hired a freelance editor to take a first whack at getting it down in length, mostly because it's so hard for the author to "murder his babies," as the expression goes. So this freelance editor delivered to me an edited manuscript that was about the length it is now, with one-third of the words removed. Then I went through and began reshaping and changing some of the language she had changed, to make it feel more kid-friendly. I started changing it back toward my voice but still had in mind that "I'm writing this for 8-, 9-, and 10-year-olds, so let's keep it simple." I see the book as really true to Marley & Me, [but] with sections that weren't appropriate for kids removed, some of the language simplified.

What was taken out?
Everything about the marriage relationship and my career is gone. So Marley: A Dog Like No Other is really a pure family-with-a-nutty-dog story that follows the arc that every family that has a dog goes through: that arc from exuberant puppyhood through adulthood into old age and having to say goodbye to your dog.

The other thing that was taken out was a scene about my neighbor, a teenage girl being stabbed, an attempted rape—it's actually my favorite chapter. Marley and I heard her screams and ran to her, and I sat there and held her on the sidewalk—she was bleeding—waiting for the ambulance to get there.

Did Marley open the way for more dog memoirs?
There's always been the dog "how-to" practical book and the real niche books for pure dog lovers. But Marley & Me, I think, broke through the market niche categories. It's not really just "a dog book"—at least I like to think it's not. And it drew an audience much larger than these pure dog books do. So suddenly there are lots of dog memoirs and dog novels out there right now. I can't say that it's because of me or not, but I think it's a safe assumption that the success of my book has had something to do with publishers' willingness to give a closer look to books along these themes.

What is it about dogs that so many humans love so much?
Dogs are so amazingly loyal; they're just hardwired as social pack animals to ingratiate themselves into the pack, and when that pack is your family and you're the alpha of that pack, they're just your most loyal, constant companion. And it's hard not to return that loyalty and that devotion. So the bond can become pretty intense.

Marley died in 2003, right?
Right, December 2003. We got Gracie in December 2004. She is two-and-a-half. I call her the anti-Marley. She's really a calm, sedate dog, and she's from really good hunting stock. My joke is, "You're a great dog, Gracie, but don't expect me to write another book about you."