CHANGING DIRECTION: A DIFFERENT PATH CAN BRING BLESSINGS

A few years ago, we (my publisher Oaktara and I) chose to change the dog's name in my books as well as my first book's title and series name.  Suffice it to say that an individual planned to sue if we didn't, saying he/she had placed a trademark on the name I had used.  Although my dog's name was not really under a trademark, we decided that years of court battles and hundreds of thousands of  dollars in costs were just not worth the battle, although we were not in the wrong.  My book would have been shelved during those years as well.  I've found that the individual in question has also gone after other authors and entities for that same reason, citing that he/she was planning a TV series using the dog's name that I (and they) had chosen.  That TV series, by the way, has never happened.