Being a Dog: Following the dog Into a World of Smell, by Alexandra Horowitz. You want to read this book. You need to read this book. Your dog wants you to read this book. It is, simply, fantastic.
Here’s why: First, the information about olfaction is riveting. There has been a lot written about the dog and his or her sense of smell, especially in two of my favorite books, What the Dog Knows by Cat Warren and Scent of the Missing by Susannah Charleson. Being a Dog enriches our understanding about the world of smell, in innumerable ways.
She does that, in part, by comparing the ways dogs and people use their nose to navigate their environment. Those of you who have read The Other End of the Leash and For the Love of a Dog know that I love comparative ethology, so you won’t be surprised to learn that she had me on page three, when she said “Why, you may not have even smelled this book yet, though it is but inches from your face.” I, who have never hesitated to get down on my hands and knees to see if I could smell what my dogs are sniffing, never considering using my nose to investigate the book. I laughed out loud, and settled in for a great read.
Horowitz delves into the topic like a bloodhound with her nose buried in leaf litter. (Sorry, couldn’t resist.) She visits The Working Dog Center at the University of Pennsylvania to see how scent detection dogs are trained. She takes an animal tracking class that uses scent as much as vision to find traces of wildlife. (Porcupine urine smells are, well, pine-y.) She spends time with perfumers and learns how they educate their noses. Her husband delivers a large package housing 54 small bottles of “wine notes” that she spends months sniffing to train her nose and brain how to distinguish between them.
The book is full of fascinating information: Tail wagging disperses a dog’s scents from their anal-genital reason, which might be why they tail wag so often when greeting others. Dogs inhale through the middle of their nostrils, but exhale out the slits in the side (she’ll explain why). But more than that, it’s beautifully written. Horowitz has always been a good writer, but she’s hit her stride here. I loved her writing–engaging and always interesting, I flew through the book this weekend. I just counted over 23 little post-it notes on pages I want to which I want to return. Don’t miss this one, it’s a winner.
Secret Service Dogs: The Heroes Who Protect the President of the United States, by Maria Goodavage. A note from the author at the beginning of the book says it took nine months to get security clearance to research and write this book. As she says, “It is, after all, the Secret Service.” To get clearance Goodavage left out the obvious problematic details, like names, specific tactics and places where the dogs train. But, perhaps in part because of her work on dogs in the military (Solider Dogs and Top Dog), the author gained unprecedented access to the dogs that we never see: The working canines who protect POTUS, the first family and those in the White House from danger.
There’s plenty here to impress any dog lover, from the dedication between dogs and handlers, some crazy exciting moments when dogs were deployed in split seconds to stop a “fence jumper” from continuing a mad dash toward the first family’s home, and the devastation the ERT (Emergency Response Team) felt when someone got past them in September 2014, over powered a Secret Service agent and made it deep into the White House. These are guys, as is made clear on almost every page, who don’t like to lose, and are obsessed, in the best of all possible ways, with doing their job right the first time. And to doing right by their dogs. Gotta love that.
That said, I have some quibbles. At times the book reads as though it was written by a public relations firm. I’ll grant that there is a lot good to say about these dogs and their handlers, but there are also some interesting questions raised here that could use some inquiry. For example, Goodavage writes that no female dogs are ever used by the Secret Service, because if they went into heat it would be disruptive. Well, dogs can be spayed. And males can be neutered, although the dogs never are, she writes. Hummm. There’s little question that the secret service dog culture is as male dominated as anywhere in the country. Lots of talk about “alpha males” and an ethos of hiding how very much your dog means to you, even though all the other handlers feel the same way. Part of me wants to send them on a retreat for a group hug; the other part of me wants them around me when I’m feeling threatened. None of this is especially surprising, but I would have enjoyed a bit more of a thoughtful analysis from the author than is found in this otherwise interesting and heart-felt book.
NON FICTION
Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis, by J. D. Vance. I can’t say it any better than the summary on Amazon. “J.D. Vance tells the true story of what a social, regional, and class decline feels like when you were born with it hung around your neck.” This deeply moving memoir describes his family’s attempt to break out of the extreme poverty of Appalachia and live a middle class life. Many of them failed, although Vance himself goes on to get a law degree from Yale, in part thanks to the steadfast force of his grandmother (who, granted, threatened to use her car to run over someone she felt had dishonored her family) and to the mentoring he received as a Marine. If you want to understand what’s happening in America right now, you need to read this book. If you don’t care about that, but would like to read a fascinating and beautifully written memoir, then read it for that.
Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End, by Atul Gawande. The author is a surgeon who practices medicine but reminds us of its limitations in this thoughtful, ground breaking book. While western medicine has accomplished miracles, it has also shaped and constrained how we handle aging, often ignoring the elderly’s need for a sense of community, autonomy and connection, while imposing hospital-based restrictions on people in assisted living and nursing homes. If you have any friends or family who is unable to live alone, or if you are lucky enough to live to be an elderly person yourself, this book is vital. It’s also eminently readable and well written. I read it in two sittings and think about it on a daily basis.
FICTION
Our Souls at Night, by Kent Haruf. This sweet, tender book about two elderly people who find solace by defying convention and spending their nights together is a treasure. I loved it so much I’ll be reading the author’s earlier books over the winter. Read this before going to sleep at night instead of watching the nightly news, and cuddle into your pillow with gratitude for writers like Haruf who can express our shared humanity so well.
Next week I have another book to talk about–what it is about fall that makes books feel so important? Perhaps we’re all just classically conditioned to “going back to school” in fall? I did so love buying my text books, and bringing home notebooks empty and open to the knowledge to come.
What about you? What are you reading?
MEANWHILE, back on the farm: Another unseasonably balmy weekend, so we got to spend the night in the tent on Friday listening to snowy tree crickets sing the night’s passage into dawn. Here’s the foggy, fuzzy world from the tent’s deck a little after sunrise:
Also saw The Book of Mormon in Milwaukee this weekend (thanks Jenna!) and had a ridiculously laugh-filled lunch with friends. (We were the table you wished you hadn’t sat beside because we laughed so hard it interfered with your lunch. So sorry…) Here’s one of the things we laughed about: this photo of dear friend (and kick ass zoologist) Dr. Annakee Lisberg’s dog, Belly Button. BB was rescued by veterinarian Dr. Jenna Buley, after he lost an eye and his owners wanted him put to sleep. I’m happy to say that he has a wonderful, happy life now. I’ll look up this photo whenever I need a smile, and a reminder that I’m not the only one who isn’t photogenic.
Diane says
First…I disagree with your assessment about being non-photogenic!
Second…I can hardly wait to read A Horowitz’s book….I ordered it the same time I ordered your book and I think I may not receive either until February! I witnessed the “tail wagging dispersing” with my dog. I probably mentioned this in a previous blog, but we sometimes meet a neighborhood dog who, when seeing us, always freezes and looks straight at my dog. I always wonder if she may become aggressive based on this behavior. One time when we met, my dog beautifully sniffed the ground first, but then, as he walked away, lifted his nub of a tail and wagged. She followed, air sniffed, then they greeted and all was okay. Very interesting to me and I look forward to reading more on this subject.
Actually, I look forward to all the good reads, including yours!
Carol says
Thank you for the book reviews and photos. Fall and reading do go together. Belly Button, you rock!
Robyn says
I have just finished “Being a Dog” myself. I find myself breathing deeper now. I also enjoy watching my dogs sniff more. Horowitz compares dog pushing their noses into smells to us stepping closer to a painting to appreciate the brush strokes. That has expanded my patience greatly on our walks. I work as a dog walker and therefore have a dog scented car. Yesterday I realized I was being sniffed in traffic! I had the windows down and a dog head emerged from the car ahead and began “air sniffing” eventually orienting directly to me. Our eyes met and dog was searching for all those dog he could smell. Before the book I would have missed this special moment of understanding.
Jane Craig says
I just asked my husband to get me “Love Is All You Need: The Revolutionary Bond-Based Approach to Educating Your Dog” for Christmas. Pat Miller reviewed it in “The Whole Dog Journal.” Maybe because I seem better at bonding with, than with training my dogs to do a litany of tasks, I want to read it! I look forward to being given complete permission to love my dog and to disregard anyone whose attitude is “but…s/he’s just a dog!”
I’m a new reader of this blog, so maybe you have already mentioned this book; I should probably check the archives!
Vicki in Michigan says
Love BB! Living proof that you don’t need what convention thinks of as “good looks” to have a great life, or to lift the lives of others. đ
As for your laughing lunch — no apologies necessary. Vastly rather sit right by you all, laughing away, than anywhere in the same room with the “parent” and the running-amok toddler………….
Jovi Larson says
Thank you for adding some great books to my reading list. As for my future reads: it’s about time for a 4th reading of Gary Paulsen’s Winterdance: The Fine Madness of Running the Iditarod – probably in Jan or Feb, closer to the actual event.
Your review of Hillbilly Elegy reminded me of David Baldacci’s Wish You Well (2000). It is completely different from the genre he is best known for. The novel was inspired by his maternal ancestors in rural SW Virginia. Plot description and reviews can be found online ((nd are probably more complete and better written than I can provide here). Definitely worth a look.
Trisha says
Jovi: I LOVED Winterdance! I’ll put it on the list to re-read. Thanks for the reminder.
Andy says
I’m working through the classic six. I’ve finished three and am almost done with the Donaldson and Handelman books. The Pryor one will be the last. They are all, of course, excellent.
I have to say I was really blown away by Pamela Reid’s book. I expected it to be the most opaque but I was wrong. I really appreciated her frank discussion of aversive control and punishment and all the ways efforts to extinguish can go wrong. I will be re-reading this one for sure, this time with post-its nearby.
lin says
BB proves that a great smile can make anyone gorgeous.
My most recent enjoyable read was “The Underdogs: children, dogs, and the power of unconditional love” by Melissa Fay Greene. It chronicles a service dog organization 4 Paws for Ability that supplies service dogs for children. Greene is a powerful writer (her ‘Praying for Sheetrock’ was a National Book Award finalist) but can also be pretty funny, especially when talking about her own dogs. The author involves not only the founder of 4 Paws, its principal trainer, but also several of the parents, and one of the prisoners who does initial training of rescue dogs.
Loved ‘Book of Mormon’ and have gotten the soundtrack to ‘Hamilton.’ I’m in no way a hiphop fan, but I really love the music, and am currently reading “Hamilton: the revolution” which chronicles the background of the show (not ready to tackle Chernow’s biography)
I was really moved by “Being Mortal” and made me think very hard on how to listen to my parents and husband on what will happen as we age. I’ve also thought a lot after listening to this Radiolab podcast: http://www.radiolab.org/story/262588-bitter-end/
Kelli says
Ah, Kent Haruf… One of the best books I’ve ever read is his Plainsong. If you liked Our Souls at Night, RUN to your library/bookstore for Plainsong.
Mireille says
Thanks Trisha for sharing the book reviews.
I did a lot of reading on our holiday last month. Most impressive book “The body keeps the score” by Bessel van der Kolk. A book about trauma in humans, what it does to body and mind and the many ways to healing. A very touching but also tough to read book, especially the chapters about child abuse. But aso a very inspiring book. I could not helping thinking every now and then about the difference between dogs and humans in how they are effected by traumatic events. If you ever get round to reading it, I would be very interestend about your comments.
Somewhat lighter: reading “Daring greatly” by Brene Brown. Also inspiring.
On the side I am also reading Bill Bryson’s “At home – A short history of private life”. I love the way he indulges in the most bizarre facts and yet again food for thought, about how things we think of as “normal” are in fact very recent findings (such as being comfortable and warm in your house)
Hmmm, my only dog book is in Dutch, by father and son Oldenburg, about training SAR and detection work in dogs, very interested in the book you mentioned from Alexandra Horowitz.
Holiday reading: Ten trees and a Truffle dog, by Jamy Ivey. He wrote a couple of books about how he moved from London to France, to settle in Provence. His books make you hungry and thirsty – and sometimes somewhat irritated by the way he describes his struggles, at least I sometimes think “you could have prepared yourself slightly better, stop whining” đ
A funny and very endearing novel: “A man named Ove” (also a movie) by Fredrick Backman. From the official book description “A grumpy yet loveable man finds his solitary world turned on its head when a boisterous young family moves in next door.” (it’s a bit like “The 100 Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared” but less absurd)
Hmmmm I also have a whole pile of books I have yet to read (another Bill Bryson- The road to little dribbling”, a book bij a Dutch Ultrarunner & photographer Jolande Linschooten and “Busy” bij Tony Crabbe. Yet to find the time… đ
Mason Small says
I loved Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal, too, largely because it helped me think through end of life/quality of life issues for my dogs, as well as for humans. Whenever one of my dogs is dying, I find reading books about illness/dying/death/grieving in the human world to be great therapy. Along these lines (and sorry to provide bleaker subject matter) I’d recommend The Year of Magical Thinking, Wave, and When Breath Becomes Air.
I’m looking forward to Horowitz’s Being a Dog, although I’m sure I’ll have to stop telling the dogs “It’s a walk, not a sniff tour” (my hint to get moving) after reading it.
Kat says
Thank you for providing my Christmas wishlist, lol. My husband always complains that even though he knows how much I love books and reading he’s afraid to buy me books for Christmas because chances are good I’ll already have whatever he’d pick. This time I can just point him to this blog and say “any of these.” Although, in truth I may pick up Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End, by Atul Gawande right away. My 90 year old mother-in-law wants to age in place and currently is able to care for herself well but the handwriting is on the wall and we know that honoring her wish to remain in her home will require an onsite caregiver at some point. The overwhelming task of clearing out sixty plus years of memories fell to me. Everything in that basement has a memory attached and before it can move on that story has to be told. Some days the weight of all those memories and stories that she’s given to me is a huge burden.
For dog books I recently finished Pit Bull: The Battle over an American Icon by Bronwen Dickey. It was quite fascinating and touched on a lot of societal factors that play a role in how we perceive this type of dog.
Fiction, reading Precious and Grace by Alexander McCall Smith the latest is the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series. We recently had the opportunity to hear him speak. I loved his books before but after listening to him talk I love them even more. He is a truly delightful gentleman.
angi buettner says
Thank you so much for that photo of Belly Button and the very hearty laugh it caused together with your writing đ
I just started reading Through a Dog’s Ear. I know it’s a bit “old” but it looked like a good start for me to learn how I can help my rescue dog who has recently developed a massive fear of fireworks – and from there of backfiring motorbikes, to motorbikes, to cars driving fast and thunderstorms to rain and wind. Devastating. If anybody has any more recent, good and scientifically sound advice on where to learn about sound phobias, that would be great.
Aunt Sam says
I’m a librarian, so this is my jam.
For doggie fiction, I cannot say enough good things about Lily and the Octopus by Steven Rowleyâsweet, funny, heart-wrenching, redemptive. Yes, the dog dies, but we pretty much know that from page 1.
Non-dog, non-fiction…there is so much really well-written narrative NF out these days. When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi follows one person’s descent into illness. Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant by Roz Chast is the perfect complement to Being Mortal. Just Mercy by Brian Stevenson is about the US penal system; it was one of those books a colleague kept telling me to read, and I kept avoiding because I thought it was going to be lecture-y and depressing as hell. When I finally picked it up, I couldn’t put it downâso well-written. Right now, I’m listening to (and loving) Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterley, about the black female mathematicians/computers who helped us win WWII and land on the moon.
If you’re looking for light, fun reading with a heart: Stay by Allie Larkin; Maybe in Another Life by Taylor Jenkins Reid; Courtney Milan’s “casually diverse” Cyclone Series, Trade Me, The Year of the Crocodile, and Hold Me (series in progress, 4 more books to come). Jennifer McQuiston is a veterinarian who writes historical romance; many of her characters have or acquire critters that are v. important to them.
I have to stop and get ready for work now…I could do this all day.
Aunt Sam says
OhâOne Wild Bird at a Time by Bernd Heinrich was a great audiobook.
Trisha says
Don’t stop, Aunt Sam, don’t stop! What would the world do without librarians? I can’t wait to read Lily and the Octopus, thanks for that. And I second your recommendation of When Breath Becomes Air and Just Mercy. Both books are important and inspiring, but I have to say that Just Mercy took my breath away. Not to mention a chunk of my bank account when I closed the book and immediately donated to the Equal Justice Initiative. What amazing work it is doing, and what a tragedy that it has to. Thanks too Aunt Sam for the suggestions for light-hearted readingâI suspect that many of us feel the need for that right now!
Natalie says
Currently reading Movement Matters by Katy Bowmen, a collection of casual essays about the spiraling effects outsourcing movement has. I’ve followed her work for years and do my best to translate it for my dogs so as to help them lead the most physically and mentally robust life possible. Not that you need it, but I would think that this book would encourage anyone to get their dog reliable off-leash and incorporate them into their daily lives, if they were so inclined to think that way.
Kelly Schlesinger says
I highly recommend Fast into the Night, A Woman, her Dogs and their Journey North on the Iditarod Trail, by Debbie Clarke Moderow. Sled dog racing is one crazy sport. For a reader living on the Texas Gulf Coast this story could have happened on another planet. The snow, the wind, the frozen everything, people and dogs curling up in tents in subzero temperatures! The mind boggles. What I loved about this memoir was that Debbie Moderow had a happy childhood and a happy family life. She had amazing support to accomplish this goal she set for herself. And she loved her dogs. She writes about their different, quirky personalities and how they came together as a team. But it’s not sappy. It’s a great read.
Adrienne Karoly says
I appreciate your fall book suggestions. Keep them coming. They sound great. I have read Our Souls At Night. It was wonderful.
Tamasin says
@ Everybody in thanks for pointing me to more titles.
The Fly Trap by Fredrik Sjoberg. Merrily written by the Norwegian who was awarded a 2016 Ig Nobel for his treatise on âflies that are dead and flies that are not yet deadâ. About himself and earlier quirky entomologists. By the end, you have real appreciation for deep and narrow scientific passions.
The Wisdom of Trees by Max Adams. Highly informative . Beautifully written. Exquisite illustrations from 18th century. Prologue alone worth the price. I live in a forest, where I actually do hug trees, so it especially speaks to my heart as well as brain. My friends, the Redwoods, are mentioned only tangentially, since the English author talks about species growing in England (as well as U.S. and elsewhere).
haatchi & little b by Wendy Holden. Non-fiction from Great Britain. Puppy tied to railroad tracks to die loses leg and eventually becomes therapy dog for withdrawn, disabled little boy who blossoms. As a person who adopted several disabled children and dogs myself, I needed a few tissues to get through this some years ago. So real, soaring, and heartwarming that when youâre done, youâll want to keep the amazing cover photo around. Did I find referral to this book in past years of this blog? If so, double thanks.
Camille says
Love your blog, but this is always my favorite post and comments section!
Susan Tyson says
BEING MORTAL is a must read. You can tell my best friend is a best friend- we gave each other this book 2 Christmas’s ago!
Dotti says
I read Alex’s book, “Inside a Dog” last year & it really opened my eyes to the importance of smell walks to my border collies well being so I’m looking forward to this one.