Animal rights is a serious subject, but I do my best to find humor where I can, and I have some great help: there are almost two hundred cartoons included in the book, including dozens from the brilliant Bizarro strip.

Because I am all too human, I don't always do the right thing, so how can I expect others to perform perfectly on the issues that are my top priority? I don't mean that we shouldn't try to do our best, but judgment and recrimination are such heavy weights. I find that accepting that we are all fallible lightens my load.

Seriously, many people have told me they can't eat turkeys anymore after getting to know them. I think in the wider world, when the stories air on the media, they help banish the idea that birds, other than parrots, are somehow lesser.

Mostly, I make sure to stay keenly aware of my own shortcomings so that I am more patient with others. It can be hard to see a friend order a cow-milk latte when almond or soy milk is available, knowing that the friend knows what dairy cows go through, how they mourn their babies, who have been carted off to veal crates so that we can steal their milk.

Animal rights is a serious subject, but I do my best to find humor where I can, and I have some great help: there are almost two hundred cartoons included in the book, including dozens from the brilliant Bizarro strip.

Some of us seem to be born with a drive to try to make the world kinder. In my twenties, living in New York City, I worked in a soup kitchen every Sunday for many years, just trying to do my part. Then I read Animal Liberation and learned about factory farming and the killing of animals for oven cleaner and realized nobody needed my help as badly as the animals did.

Come for the body, stay for the soul.