India Opal Buloni, the narrator, begins to tell the story of finding her dog. She was sent to the Winn-Dixie grocery store by her father, whom she calls the preacher, to get some basic groceries. Halfway through the trip, the store manager and other employees fly into a panic over a dog that has gotten loose in the store. They demand someone take the dog to the pound, but Opal likes the dog. She thinks it is cute with a good disposition: “It’s hard not to immediately fall in love with a dog who has a good sense of humor” (12). She claims the dog, makes up a name for him—Winn-Dixie, the first thing that comes to her mind—and Winn-Dixie follows her outside. She inspects the dog and finds him in bad shape. Clearly, he does not belong to anyone.

On the way home, Opal explains her name to Winn-Dixie. She was named India, after the country where her father was a missionary, though her father calls her by her middle name, Opal, because it is his mother’s name, and he loved his mother very much. She also explains that Winn-Dixie must behave, because she and