This week was National Dog Day, ok, we missed it by a day or two… well, here are three VERY different doggie books that you just HAVE TO READ if you love doggies… and you might just pick up a few for your fellow doggie friends for the holidays (which are going to be here sooner than your dog can chew up a dog bone).
The exciting and funny / hilarious new Chet and Bernie book, Paw and Order, which you’ve all been waiting with doggie breath to come out so you can read it. Now you can.
Harry Truman once said “If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog.”
Cici and I were very happy to get our paws on the latest (7th in the series) Chet and BernieL book, Paw and Order because we are always up for another hilarious adventure seen thru Chet’s canine eyeballs. The story begins in New Orleans. And Bernie’s Porsche and a trip to a BBQ joint turns into a fiasco with some motorcycle dudes who have big necks. But no matter, Chet and Bernie are on the case and a team not to be messed with.
The dog-eat-dog world of Washington DC will never be the same after Chet and Bernie’s Little adventure. They could have gone straight home from New Orleans but what fun would that have been? They instead detoured because well, Bernie’s sometime girlfriend Suzie the newspaper reporter is now working at the Washington Post and she is on a BIG story that she cannot talk about. So of course, Chet sniffs around the capital city and Bernie ends up arrested. An international conspiracy unfolds and Chet encounters a strange new animal, a guinea pig, who holds the fate of the nation in his paws.
Chet and Bernie are always a winning combination. With Chet’s sharp eyes and cool nose and Bernie’s talents, they cannot lose, although it is always suspenseful along the way. Another great read for dog lovers, guinea pig aficionados, and Washington DC insiders and outsiders.
http://www.chetthedog.com/tag/paw-and-order
Off the Leash: A Year at the Dog Park by Matthew Gilbert
If you have ever visited a dog park and met some strange, weird, quirky, bizarre dog people, then you will relate to this book. It is about an array of dogs and their people who gather at Amory Park, overlooking Boston near Fenway Park.
Matthew Gilbert, a longtime TV critic at The Boston Globe, describes his reluctant trip into the dog park subculture, as the first-time owner of a stubbornly social Yellow Lab puppy named Toby. Like many Americans, he was happily accustomed to the safe distance of TV viewing and cell-phone web surfing, tethered to the digital leash. But the headstrong, play-obsessed Toby pulls him to Amory, and Amory becomes an exhilarating dose of presence for him. The joyous chaos of wrestling dogs and the park’s cast of offbeat dog owners – the “pack of freaks” – gradually draw him into the here and now. At the dog park, the dog owners go off the leash, too.
Meetings at the dog park can be mayhem, chaotic and fun, depending upon the day. Sort of a daily or weekly canine soap opera. Dogs love/hate one another as do their owners. When the dogs have disagreements, so do their human companions. And sometimes the human beans are even worse than the dogs when they are off the leash.
This is a very funny, sunny, very right on, portrait of life at the dog park and relationships and encounters between dogs and the dog owners. Dog Parks: Enter at Your Own Risk. Dog parks are not for the faint of heart or skittish. And Gilbert knows right where the fun begins and ends. His honest and enthusiastic memoir will make you rethink going to the dog park or yearning to find doggie friends and a pack to belong to.
Dogs Rule, Nonchalantly by Mark Ulriksen is just plain silly. EVERYONE who is ANYONE with a DOG that is KNOWS that Dogs Rule. Of course, my Polka Dot Princess agrees with me on that one. She Rules this household. Of course. Ulriken has been working for a little publication called The New Yorker, where he has been a regular contributor since 1993. He has achieved more than 40 magazine covers to his credit. This book offers great illustrations of doggies, and funny lines to go with the images. We were offput by one illustration of what seemed to be a bad stereotype of a bully breed dog. We do not like those stereotypes as you know. Other than that, numerous breeds were represented in hilarious detail. And some of the jokes were VERY funny. If you live or love a dog, you know how amusing they can be. And this book capitalizes upon canines and their goofyness with refreshing charm and a breath of doggie sunshine. Dogs penchant for stinky things. Dogs and their always sunny disposition (until you are leaving the house). And you know the rest of their quirks.
