Ward Cleaver author sells Parrothood

Last year, Jenny Gardiner won a contest to get her novel Sleeping with Ward Cleaver published that proved both her writing and marketing mettle.

She follows that this year with the sale of her memoir, Parrothood: Twenty Years of Caring for a Vengeful Bird Determined to Kill Me, to Simon Spotlight for hardback publication in spring 2010. On her blog, Gardiner describes the pitch: "Think David Sedaris meets Marley and Me, only with a powerful, ferocious beak."

Graycie, the parrot that resides in Gardiner's Glenmore family room, declined to comment.