Living with DogsText by Laurence Sheehan
Photographs by William Stites
nonfiction, 1999
finished, 4/18/08
Living with Dogs might be described as a 'coffee table book.' Well, yes, maybe. It is large, and it does feature many dog pictures, but it is really more than this. I found it enchanting, and filled with the love that people have for their canine friends. We see some 'doggy' collections such as figurines, paintings, mugs, etc. There is a dog camp where owners and their pups can go. There's a chapter on The Leash, a club in NYC for 'sportsmen and dog fanciers.' This may sound trivial but it was started in the 1920s by people who served as watchdogs - pardon the pun - over the American Kennel Club. Their goals were met, and then it became more of a place for dog lovers to get together. There is a whole chapter on herding dogs, and another on the late Brooke Astor, a great dog lover, who said: I don't like people who don't like dogs - I just don't. This is a woman who married a man when she was sixteen years old because he promised her all the dogs she wanted!
I loved this book, though I wouldn't recommend buying it until you borrow it from the library and see if it is a book you want in your collection. I probably won't buy it, but I sure did enjoy reading it and looking at all the great photographs of people who are just as wild about dogs as I am. A reader named April recommended this book to me when I wrote my annual Westminster Dog Show post back in February, and I thank you so very much.
So odd that you should post about this book again: I was thinking about it and decided if I could go online and find a good used copy for some new bookshelves my husband has built. I love your site so much and enjoy the guest posts as well. As for other book recommendations, your writing style reminds me so much of the late, great garden writer Elizabeth Lawrence. If you haven't read her, you should pick up some of her works on your next library trip. Cheers and happy spring!
ReplyDeleteApril, I'm so, so glad you wrote. When I click your name it comes up as "blogger profile cannot be displayed." Do you have a blog? And what a compliment. What a nice thing to say. I love Elizabeth L. Thank you for saying you like the blog and Tom's posts. It means so much to me.
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