Snootle

 

Snootle is about a melodramatic puppy who teams up with an over-opinionated garden snake in order to keep their human out of trouble.

Snootle ™ was created by Tia Petty, and debuted in 2004 via Snootle.com. 

Snootle is a cute little puppy. Much to the dismay of Patrick, Snootle needs to be groomed often as she has a shedding problem. Snootle hates baths and will do anything to get out of taking one. Spending her free time daydreaming of freedom to roam beyond the backyard and eat whatever she wants, she is only allowed to eat dog food, but escapes often.

Repty is an orphaned garden snake that lives in an aquarium in Patrick’s bedroom. Repty is the best friend of Snootle and Patrick. Repty’s parents got taken away by a pet store owner after he was born and were sold. All alone, he was left to wander the streets and didn’t even have a name. He took refuge in Snootle’s back yard. Patrick found the little garter snake and named him Repty. Repty was pleased that he found someone who didn’t recoil in terror at the sight of him.

Patrick is Snootle the dog and Repty the snake’s best friend. They often find loads of trouble just from their backyard, especially when it comes to encounters with Tilly the squirrel and Aster the cat. Much to the grief of Patrick, Snootle tends to escape the back yard, where he finds many adventures in hunting for his dog. When not chasing after Snootle, Patrick is often found in his bedroom on his computer, with Snootle sleeping at his feet.

Available on Amazon: Snootle by Tia Petty

Snootle, the self-titled book, has been written in a comic strip format, and can be read in several ways. You can read it from cover to cover, thumb through it and choose the comics that catch your eye for a quick laugh, or you can open up a page and read the story. 

Each story was written as a two-page spread from beginning to end. The first image of the story gives the reader an idea about the rest of the story. It is a fun, colorful and dynamic book. This big book of Snootle has nearly 100 pages and is suitable for all ages.

Other Characters

Tilly is a gray squirrel who drinks coffee and walks sideways on the trees in order to balance the coffee. It looks like she is walking straight up with her hind legs. Her favorite pastime is to pester Snootle and get her into trouble with Patrick. Tilly lives in a tree in the backyard. She is neighbors to Prim, Rose and Bud, the escaped parakeets of Mrs. Florrie.

Bud is the budding parakeet teenager of Prim and Rose who often listens to loud music and disturbs Snootle. He often gets Snootle, Patrick and Repty in trouble with his wild ideas and adventures.

Kiwi is a Pomeranian and the spoiled rotten princess of the group. She is cute, witty, and gets away with everything.

Millet is a house mouse with cowboy instincts. He thinks quick on his feet and can figure a way out of any bad situation.

Honeydew is a fruit bat who loves flowers and beauty. She tries to get the tomboy Snootle to enjoy more girly things such as wearing bows and picking flowers.

Mrs. Florrie is the sweet old neighbor of Patrick, he finds himself learning many lessons from her wisecrack teachings. She had owned the parakeet family Prim, Rose and Bud, but they had escaped the cage from the clutches of Aster, her cat. After the parakeets escape, they had made a home in the adjacent yard. Mrs. Florrie now enjoys their company when they visit a birdbath in her back yard.

Aster is the mean old stray cat. Mrs. Florrie found the cat irresistible and tries to lure him to be her cat. She named him Aster after her flowers in the garden. Aster being a stray cat did not have a name, and since he cannot speak human, he cannot object to such a foofy name. The cat is much too independent for such refinements, however, feels guilty not indulging an old lady, plus Aster cannot resist the fresh milk.

Prim is a parakeet. He is the husband of Rose and the father of Bud. He is militant in his strictness, and does not put up with any nonsense. He keeps Bud, Snootle and Repty in line when they get into mischief in the backyard.

Rose is the loving wife of Prim and the mother of Bud. She is often in the yard of Mrs. Florrie having tea and discussing old times. The family, Prim, Rose and Bud used to live in a cage at Mrs. Florrie’s house. However, having escaped, they now live in a tree house in Snootle’s yard. Snootle and Mrs. Florrie are neighbors.

Dr. Foster is the veterinarian of all the animals from dogs to snakes. He also boards the critters overnight for when the humans want to go on vacation without their pets.

The latest book, Snootle In: How To Treat Your Puppy, is a 25-page children’s book about Snootle meeting Patrick for the first time. They have to learn how to live with each other and survive puppyhood. It gives basic, but effective tips in dog obedience training. The book is written in a simple way so young readers can understand. It has many laughs to keep mom and dad entertained while reading to their children.

Both books were created entirely on an iPad Pro with an Apple Pencil. “The process was both fun and challenging to create books exclusively on an iPad,” said Petty. “It took about a month of experimenting with different apps to find the ones that would actually do the job.” Petty used Procreate for the drawing, Medibang Paint for the panels, and ComicDraw for the page layout and book processing.

The concept of Snootle came about from the reality of living through the joys of puppyhood. Instead of getting angry at the puppy chaos, Petty channeled her frustrations into a funny comic strip. The Snootle character was designed after the artist’s yellow, pointy-eared dogs. The name Snootle derived a mashup of her dog names of Doodles and Snoot.

The Cartoonist

Hi! My name is Tia, the last three letters of my first name, Anawanitia.

I drew pictures all of my life, and have been playing guitar since... eeeeerrrrmmm, well, before cell phones and the Internet were a thing. As a child, I got into big trouble after drawing a portrait of my black cat on the wall with a sharpie pen. IN college, I took a drawing class, and hired private teachers to teach me how to paint. 

In the early 2000s, I had accepted a job as an editorial cartoons at the Big Bear Grizzly Newspaper. I wanted to write my own cartoons that did not involve politics or other stressful situations.

Editorial Cartoon by Anawanitia

A few years before the cartooning job, my husband (the best human in the world) and I adopted a cute pointy-eared dog. I noticed that dog and the two little dogs I had grown up with were all yellow, brown and white with pointy ears. So I started to doodle a cartoon dog with those features.

First doodles of Snootle

I got the name Snootle from combining my dogs names, Doodles and Snoot.

Early Snootle comic, old school ink.

Available on Amazon: Snootle by Tia Petty

Snootle the comic strip debuted at Snootle.com in 2004. Snootle the paperback book published in Nov. 28, 2017 and is available in paperback at $19.99. 

Snootle In: How To Treat Your Puppy version published on April 27, 2018 and is available for free under Kindle Unlimited, or $2.99 to own. The paperback version published on May 2, 2018 and is available for $9.99. All books are made and printed in the USA and are available on Amazon.com.

Available on Amazon: Snootle in: How To Treat Your Puppy

Thanks for reading!

Tia Petty, creator of Snootle