Candidates and friends of Miles LeHane who have visited The Glenfiddich House during the past 5 years were usually greeted at the door by the company mascot—Bacchus, a near-100 pound German Shepherd, big but cuddly and always thrilled to see children.

In June, Melanie and David Miles went for a 35th Anniversary Vacation to Alaska. During their absence Bacchus was boarded in the oft-used kennel in Leesburg. Somehow, while out exercising something bit him on the leg—either a spider or perhaps a copperhead snake. Whatever it was, the leg became very inflamed and made Bacchus very sick. The Miles’ son, Scott was monitoring the case with the vet and giving reports to Melanie and David that improved from critical, to guarded, to stable—but still very ill.

When the trip had ended and Melanie and David returned, Bacchus’ leg was bandaged from ankle to armpit with a severe infection raging beneath. Bacchus was 9 years old, and with no clear end in sight for a satisfactory recovery, the Miles made the very difficult decision to have him put down. He is sorely missed by all the family and staff.

Those of our readers who have attended Forum events in the past have been part of network- and self-awareness building in the business environment.

The Glenfiddich Forum for Women will take a slightly different approach for the next session on October 27 (4 to 7 PM)—exploring with novelist Tawni O’Dell what it is like going back to one’s roots, and identifying in a different way the importance of family values.

With her second novel, Coal Run, O’Dell takes us back to the coal-mining country of western Pennsylvania, the territory she renders with such striking authenticity. Driven by the same honesty and compassion for a place and a way of life that made O’Dell’s first novel so unforgettable, Coal Run is an uncompromising and absorbing novel about letting go of the goals of greatness for the ordinary grace of hard work, family ties, and an acceptance of where you come from.

Described by People magazine as “another winner”, “a muscular, memorable drama,” and praised by Entertainment Weekly as “rich, compassionate storytelling,” Coal Run has been receiving the same enthusiastic response from readers and critics as O’Dell’s first novel. According to Publishers’ Weekly, her books are “fierce, sharply drawn and richly sympathetic tributes to working-class America.” Kirkus Reviews has deemed it “pretty close to a masterpiece,” while one of her readers from a Pennsylvania coal town recently emailed her Website: “You’ve given us a voice.”

Like her first novel, Back Roads, Tawni delineates “pitch-perfect characters, driven by the same raw energy, humor, suspense and compassion for a place and a way of life” that made her first novel so unforgettable. An Oprah Book Club selection and Book-of-the-Month-Club Main Selection, Back Roads spent nine weeks on the New York Times bestseller list and went on to be published in fifteen countries and translated into six languages. It’s soon to be a major motion picture for DreamWorks.

Born and raised in the Allegheny Mountains of western Pennsylvania, O’Dell has been writing fiction since she was a child. After graduating with a journalism degree from Northwestern University, she worked for several small newspapers before deciding to stay home to raise her two children and work fulltime on writing novels.

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