The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies sequels are the best known and most successful of Potter's books. The author had an affinity for rabbits; she lived with them as pets and observed them closely for years. Though she once wrote that rabbits were creatures of "warm volatile temperaments" and were "shallow and extremely transparent", she invested her rabbits with a variety of characterizations consistent with the nature of the animal. All the rabbit tales were inspired in part by Joel Chandler Harris's Uncle Remus stories, which Potter began illustrating as early as 1893 in an attempt to find career direction and probably because they featured a
George Remus undercover prohibition agent Franklin Dodge, who was there to gather information of that sort. Instead of reporting the information, Dodge resigned his job and began an affair with Remus' wife. Dodge and Holmes liquidated Remus' assets and hid as much of the money as possible, in addition to attempting to deport Remus, and even hiring a hit man to murder Remus for $15,000. In addition, Remus's Fleischmann Distillery was sold by Holmes. Remus' wife gave her imprisoned husband only $100 of the multimillion-dollar empire he created. In late 1927, Imogene Holmes filed for divorce from Remus. On the way to