J is for Javelina

The javelina (hah-veh-LEE-nah) is a wild porcine critter that lives in parts of Southwestern U.S. and all the way to South America. For some inexplicable reason, one of them wanders into one of my novels and makes himself at home. The little fella becomes the pet of a young Tohono O'Odham girl named Sally Windflower and takes to eating Brussels sprouts and other scrapings off her dinner plate. But why in the name of the Chihuahua Desert does she name him Poindexter? The answer is that there is no answer. The name was literally the first one that popped into my head, and it seemed just as absurd as the rest of the story. So it was good enough for me.

The animal is also known as a peccary. I don't have any good pix of my own, so the following comes from costaricajourneys.com. Note that it lacks wings, but Poindexter lacks them as well. Readers of When Pigs Fly will understand that the "flying" is purely figurative and that the book is not for children.