The HIDDEN LIFE OF DOGS
3 journalers for this copy...
from a TLC book club member
I tried, but I this book just didn't connect with me. Saving for the Wild Things bookbox. I'm sure there's someone who will like it. Barbette raved about it.
Journal Entry 3 by NancyNova at -- By Hand Or Post, Ray/Ring, RABCK in Lansdale, Pennsylvania USA on Saturday, February 1, 2014
Released 10 yrs ago (2/8/2014 UTC) at -- By Hand Or Post, Ray/Ring, RABCK in Lansdale, Pennsylvania USA
WILD RELEASE NOTES:
Adding to the Wild Thing Book Box.
Fly away little book!
Fly away little book!
Took this from the Wild Thing book box. Thanks!
A woman tells us her observations and experiences raising 10 dogs; 2 pugs, a dingo, 2 dingo mixes and some huskies.
I was reminded of Farley Mowatt's writing, but maybe that is just because they both write of wolves. Certainly she doesn't have his sense of humor. This is more woman with dogs observes and records. She particularly wants to see how they interact on their own with other dogs, how they organize themselves in rank and act as a pack compared to how wolves organize themselves in the wild. This is OK except that she is living in Cambridge while she lets her husky Misha voyage on his own or with his "wife" Maria, and she tags along sometimes to observe. She loses Misha later on when complaints by a neighbor, in which the neighbor is right by law, forces her to give him away. Wow, maybe she should have been living somewhere the dog could roam safely before she let him loose. He didn't get hit by a car but he lost his family, quite a consequence.Also, one of her female dogs kills most of the puppies of the dingo. Why didn't she prevent this if she understood the instinctual or group survival mechanics that made this not a surprising event.
I don't have a problem with the way she attributes emotions and intelligence to her animals. Anyone who owns or interacts with animals knows that animals have emotions and intelligence.
There isn't much to this book, and other than the above incidents I did not have much emotional response to it. It was kind of weird, her relationship to the dogs; less like an person who has dogs and loves them, and more like a pseudo-scientist. I do think she loved them but it was still odd in some ways, cold.
I am listing this book in the non fic VBB which is up and running again with booklady331.
Selected from the non-fic VBB
It has been mailed to the book crosser who requested it. Happy travels!
Thank you, booksandmusic, for sending this to me in Texas. Now that I have a dog, I will be definitely interested in what is going on in her mind, haha.