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If I had to pick one part of my life that made me who I am today, I’d choose living
in Florida in the 1960s. My folks had a little tourist trap called Dogland. We had over 100
breeds of dogs on display. My family was part of the civil rights struggle—here’s my
brother and me at a march for integration. Dad became infamous as the only liberal in
Levy County. We couldn’t get fire insurance because word was out the Ku Klux *** would
burn us down. Dad let everyone know he would meet late-night visitors with a shotgun. They
never came. I wrote a novel about that time called Dogland. It’s got some true parts
and some fantasy parts. The true parts are probably stranger than the parts I made up.