This is the story of a young man named John Thomas Stuart XI and his beloved pet, Lummox. Lummox is a large, talking alien creature with eight legs. He has been the Stuart family pet for years, and has always been obedient and docile, except for the time he ate the secondhand Buick. Now Lummox has gone on a rampage and accidentaly caused a lot of damage, and the city wants to destroy him. John Thoimas won't give him up without a fight, and things become REALLY complicated when a spacecraft from Lummox's home planet shows up.
This story is funny and touching, and raises the question of who is really the "pet."

Books by Robert A. Heinlein:
Beyond This Horizon
Friday
Stranger In A Strange Land
The Cat Who Walks Through Walls
The Door Into Summer
The Star Beast
To Sail Beyond The Sunset
I Will Fear No Evil
The Man Who Sold The Moon (older edition)
The Man Who Sold The Moon (newer edition)
Farnham's Freehold
Between Planets
Universe
Orphans of the Sky
Worlds To Come edited by Damon Knight, contains "Ordeal In Space"
New Destinies edited by Jim Baen, contains "This I Believe"

Released on Tuesday, March 04, 2003 at Colonial Mall in Auburn, Alabama USA.

Left propped on top of a glass case containing an eyewear display at the entrance to Sears (the entrance from the rest of the mall, not the entrance from outside), about 11:30am.