Month: December 2010

by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson

Another book about the relationships we have with dogs. Masson\’s family adopted Benjy, a labrador who was raised to be a guide for the blind but failed his schooling. As Masson sees it, Benjy is a very lovable dog but simply doesn\’t want to follow commands, preferring to do his own thing. (In that regard, he was lucky to find a home with the author\’s family, because Masson doesn\’t believe in being dominant over dogs but instead treating them as equals.) But the book is not just about Benjy his beloved dog, it\’s more about why we have closer relationships with our dogs than any other domestic animal.

His book The Dog Who Couldn\’t Stop Loving is pretty much a complete opposite of Budiansky\’s The Truth About Dogs, which asserts that dogs have evolved to take advantage of our species and all their begging and fawning is just to get something out of us. Masson sees it differently. He believes that most dogs have an amazing capacity for unconditional love, and moreover, that we as humans have learned to be more loving, altruistic, kind, etc because we evolved alongside dogs. I thought at first his theory was pretty far-fetched, particularly because there\’s no way he can look back so far into prehistory to prove any of it, and because I kept thinking: what about dogs that aren\’t loving? what about people who hate animals, or are afraid of dogs? Masson says near the beginning of the book \”There is hardly a human on earth who has not at some point in his or her life felt close to an animal from a different species- and not just a dog. And almost every dog has at some point felt friendly feelings not just for us or for other dogs, but for other animals as well.\” I\’m not sure how much I believe such a blanket statement, but the further I read in his book the more stuff he came up with for his theory. Even things like aggressive dogs, cultures that revile dogs, proof of other animals making friends with different species (how many clips on the internet can you find of a cat snuggling with the family bunny, or something similar?) were all addressed. Masson states that dogs and people have a lot in common that they don\’t share with any other species- retaining playfulness into adulthood, helping others in need, considering another species to be part of their family- and keeps going back to the idea that this is because we evolved alongside one another for so many thousands of years. He compares the behavior and human-animal connection of dogs to that of wolves, dingoes, horses, pigs, cats and other domestic animals. Dogs always come out on top (although he thinks pigs could be just as close to people, given the chance!)

I did feel a bit annoyed at some of his statements about cats, especially seeing that the author himself lived with five cats at one time and wrote an excellent book about them. So I was a bit surprised when he points out how his dog Benjy always gravitates to people who like dogs. Cats, he says, do the opposite: walking into a room they will pick the person who hates or fears cats and sit on their lap- \”Perverse,\” he says, \”and we don\’t know why they do it.\” I thought this was simply because of the different way cats communicate- to a cat, a stranger staring at them is a threat, so the person who is giving the cat the least amount of direct attention is the one who will appear most friendly. Masson even talks about how cats and dogs use eye contact differently in another part of the book, so I don\’t know why he found this so strange.

Well, even if I didn\’t agree with everything the author said here, the book was a very interesting read. It flows easily and seems to be well-researched; there are extensive notes and references in the back. (Which, incidentally, have added a dozen more titles to my TBR!) Recommended to dog-lovers; even if you don\’t agree with the author\’s theory, you will find this interesting reading!

Rating: 3/5 …….. 249 pages, 2010

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Animal Person

by Viki Myron and Bret Witter

The past week I\’ve gone through a string of frustratingly uninteresting (to me) books. The latest ones I borrowed from the library to finish up my TBR challenge just were not grabbing my interest: Split Estate, Last of Her Kind, The God of Small Things, Sweetness in the Belly. All failed me before fifty pages. Even Walden, which I\’ve wanted to read forever, was so difficult to get into I gave up. So it was nice to find something that looked familiar and friendly on the shelf: Dewey the famous library cat.

Dewey\’s Nine Lives isn\’t all about Dewey, although there are several stories of him in there. Mostly it\’s a collection of stories about other cats; their owners were inspired to share after their hearts were touched by reading about Dewey. I really enjoyed reading the first part of this book. The cats and their people are all such individuals. There are snuggly affectionate cats and bold, independent cats. Cats that came into the lives of people who sorely needed them, and others that made their way into someone\’s life who never wanted pets or cats before. My favorite story was about the cat that healed the heart of a veteran with PTSD, and the cat who amazed me was the one that spent his days roaming the wild only to come running when his owner called. That cat at different times in his life, survived an owl attack, being bitten by a coyote, and swiped by a bear! There are stories of cats who are the sole animal soaking up their owners\’ love, and then there\’s the Florida resort that was practically overrun by cats when the kind-hearted owners started feeding strays. What ties these stories all together is the deep bond each cat has with its human family, and the difference the cats made in each person\’s life. Very heartwarming stuff.

There were only a few things about the book that lessened my enjoyment of it. Some of the chapters drag at first; you get a lot of backstory about the people involved (and the history of different towns) before the cat ever comes along. The author kept interjecting her own Dewey experiences into other people\’s stories, as well. It did show how she sympathized with the other characters (sometimes people she\’d never even met) but at other times it just felt like an interruption, or filler for a story that didn\’t have enough detail. And I lost count of how many times she re-told snippets from the first Dewey book, especially finding him in the book drop. The last chapter really started to loose my interest. The first eighteen pages were all about this man\’s life before a cat made an appearance, and even then the cat had a minor role. It wasn\’t until the end when the story dovetailed with Viki\’s own that I realized why. It was more about the author\’s own personal life and just kinda lost focus for me. In the end, a new kitty comes into Viki\’s life- never one that could replace Dewey (having such an opposite personality, too!) but one that brought her new love.

If you liked Dewey, or like cats, I recommend this read! Otherwise, it might be of little interest.

Rating: 3/5 …….. 306 pages, 2010

more opinions at:
Bookfoolery and Babble
Hooser\’s Blook
Lesa\’s Book Critiques