On Dogs!, an anthology of comics (and Sai Ashram)

A shout-out for the new comics anthology Dogs!, co-edited by Vidyun Sabhaney and Jeremy Stoll. I was very pleased to hear about this book, all the more so because proceeds from sales go to Red Paws Rescue and the Sai Ashram Animal Shelter in Chhatarpur. Sai Ashram has been very important to me for over two years now. My first visit there was on the worst evening of my life, when we took Foxie there to be buried, and for many nights afterwards I couldn’t think of the place in positive terms at all: I kept dreaming that she was cold and lonely in her grave and that we had made some terrible mistake; driving along the rough road leading to the shelter was a deeply upsetting experience. But in subsequent months, going there brought a lot of comfort. I take bags of food along for the dogs there every few weeks. (A shop in Chhatarpur provides discounts on the large bags of Pedigree food if you are buying them for the ashram.) It has an amazing, dedicated team of employees and volunteers, who don’t give up in even the worst cases – on my last visit, I saw a donkey that had been badly wounded and seemed on its very last legs a few months earlier bounding about the place merrily.

Friends of animals, do try to visit Sai, or help them once in a while. (Feel free to contact me at jaiarjun@gmail.com for more information.) And do look out for the book too. Here is one of the shorter stories, a piece I really enjoyed, by the venerable Orijit Sen.

[And a long piece about the Indian comics industry here]