I felt iffy about this book, at first. When I picked it up off the library shelf, I assumed from the cover and title, that it was mostly about the author’s young black lab, Lenore. And while he does first acquire her as a puppy in this narrative, she’s not the focus by a long shot. It’s more about his border collie Izzy, and himself. The first few chapters honestly started to bore me- I noticed some inconsistencies, and the prose didn’t feel focused. He tells about finding Izzy, a border collie that had been basically living in a field with another dog for three years without human contact. Although has often stated he doesn’t take in rescue animals, the author accepts this dog, thinking he’ll rehabilitate it and then find it a new home. Instead he finds it a new job and purpose working alongside him doing hospice visits. And that’s what most of the book is about: hospice care using dogs to comfort people. Izzy seems to be a natural at it. Mostly he speaks in general about this work, but there are a few stories about specific people they visited regularly during their final weeks. Lenore, the young labrador, doesn’t really come into the picture until chapter fourteen. I didn’t see anything remarkable about her character- she’s food obsessed, friendly and energetic like most lab puppies. But her loving nature is a balm to the author, who honestly relates his struggles with depression and some health issues. For the rest of it, I wasn’t much interested in the pages about his camping trips- yes nature is peaceful and restorative, and camping can take a lot of work and planning too, but nothing about this really stood out to me. To be honest, my favorite part of the whole book was the chapter about his goats. So it was really an uneven read, one I nearly gave up on until I came to the goat chapter, but then kept going because the hospice subject was so gently and honestly written. Just felt like it needed a little better focus in some places.
Borrowed from the public library.