Shaggy Dog Stories

Archive for the ‘books’ Category

A short while ago, I reviewed Carol Quinn’s Follow My Lead and gave away a copy to a lucky winnah who will also review the book.

Carol and I had a great conversation about dogs, dog sports, and a zillion other subjects. In addition, she graciously agreed to an email interview. Here’s what we discussed…

Shaggy Dog Stories: APDT (the Association of Pet Dog Trainers) has just created the Valor Project — basically a non-competitive agility league for special needs dogs and handlers, and for anyone else who might not want to compete in AKC/USDAA/NADAC, but who would like to benefit from the advice and camaraderie to be found in an agility club. Have you checked this out yet? If you have, what do you think?

Carol Quinn: I didn’t know about this project until now, and wow — what a great idea! Many dogs can’t handle the stress or physicality of competition, but they can fully enjoy the sport with their handlers.

My focus has always been to learn and have fun, and this league seems as if it’s focused on that. The sport is also so great for dogs. It keeps their minds active, their bodies strong, and deepens the relationship with the handler. It’s also pretty good exercise for owners!

Shaggy Dog Stories: How are you training now that your time with Irina has drawn to a close? Are you working independently, or have you found another trainer?

Carol Quinn: At the moment, we aren’t training in agility. Nairobi is getting older and I think I’m retiring him. I’m ready to start training again with Sheila. I found a new trainer and as soon as the weather is cooler, we’re ready to begin again.

Lately my focus has been obedience training, believe it or not. Ridgebacks aren’t the most obedient dogs, but it is fun to work with them. We train about a half-hour a day. Ridgebacks get bored quickly, and if the “cookies” aren’t good, they completely lose interest. As long as the treats remain tasty, the training sessions are productive.



Shaggy Dog Stories: What are your next goals related to agility training? Do you think trialing will ever be in your future?

Carol Quinn: I’m open to trials, and my next ridgeback (yes, I have my eye on a puppy) will definitely compete. I’ve never enjoyed competition, but I think I’m ready to go out and try my hand at it.



Shaggy Dog Stories: Do you think you’ll try other dog sports, or will you stick with agility since it’s had such a profound effect on you?


Carol Quinn: I want to try lure coursing with Sheila because she has such a strong prey instinct, and she loves to run. You can also muzzle your dogs in coursing, so I won’t worry about Sheila going after one of the other dogs!

Competition isn’t in the cards for these dogs, but I will definitely compete with future dogs. There’s a wonderful ridgeback community in California, and the all-ridgeback agility competitions are really quite funny. Ridgebacks are quite playful — and serious — and their owners appear to have exactly the same qualities. It’s priceless.




Shaggy Dog Stories: How is Sheila’s health?

Carol Quinn: Sheila amazes me. She’s strong and funny; still a handful with other dogs, but her health is phenomenal. Her stamina is impressive, and it’s hard for me to imagine her sick. But any sign of illness still panics me.

Sheila is still on her holistic/Chinese herb protocol, but I think the better nutrition really helped her beat the odds with her disease. It was an important lesson for me to learn; healthy, fresh food makes a huge difference for dogs—and for humans.





Shaggy Dog Stories: What other projects are you working on at the moment?

Carol Quinn: I’m revising the novel I mentioned in Follow My Lead. I really love it, but I’m still tweaking it. And I’ve started a second novel — a light, funny, adventure piece.

I’ve set a goal to have the revised novel, and a credible first draft of the second by December. That’s a lot of writing, but other than running with the dogs, writing is my favorite thing on earth.





Shaggy Dog Stories: Is there anything else you’d like mentioned in the blog?

Carol Quinn: If anyone has read the book (and liked it ) please write an online review on Amazon or Barnes & Noble? Also, come visit FollowMyLeadTheBook.com and read about our progress. On Facebook, we are http://www.facebook.com/FollowMyLeadBook Come like the page, if you’re so inclined On Twitter, you can find us @FollowMyLeadcq.

If you like to get out and do things with your dogs, and if you’re filled with wonder at the depth and transformational power of the human-animal bond, you’ll want to read Follow My Lead. After spending time with Carol, Nairobi, and Sheila, don’t be surprised if your thoughts turn to the life lessons your dogs have taught you.

Congratulations Melanie Mock of Oregon for winning the drawing for the copy of Follow My Lead! Melanie said that she never wins anything, but her luck just changed. The publisher will be sending out her very own copy soon.

Next week is the Bearded Collie Club of America‘s national specialty show, and I’m a member of the hosting club. If there’s time before the festivities get underway, I’ll post another fabulous giveaway (and there are two here just waiting!).

Have a great week, and cross your fingers that we do, too!

A dog teaches a boy fidelity, perseverance, and to turn around three times before lying down — very important traits in times like these.

(Robert Benchley, Your Boy and His Dog)

Any experienced dog trainer — especially the ones who teach the beginner and puppy classes — will tell you that the real secret of teaching dog obedience classes lies in training the owners.

Although this concept lies at the heart of Carol Quinn’s Follow My Lead, don’t think for a minute that the book is just about that. The simple-sounding premise (woman at a crossroads in her personal life takes up training her dogs and learns some valuable lessons in the process) unfolds into a love letter to the human/animal bond that’s multi-layered, funny, sad, and philosophical. Along the way, Quinn learns many truths — not always the ones she’d hoped for — about human nature and human frailty. Under the mentorship of a tough cypher of an instructor and with her Rhodesian Ridgebacks to guide her, Quinn manages to parlay the lessons learned on the agility course into useful wisdom for other aspects of her life, too. She learns courage. She learns to ask more from life, and she learns not to settle for what doesn’t work.

Show of hands: Who here has read Karen Pryor’s Don’t Shoot the Dog and then immediately went out and tried to use those same techniques on your family? How many of you ended up confused or frustrated when your family members didn’t respond exactly as the book predicted? Yeah, me too. So did Quinn. She tried it on a longtime lover who had a black hole where his heart should have been, and the experience taught her volumes about things you can fix, things you can’t, and that relationships involve teamwork, too.

As Quinn learns more from her mentor about how to work with her dogs, she discovers that all her relationships evolve — including the one with her instructor and mentor.

You’ll find plenty of situations in Follow My Lead that parallel training tricks you’ve tried or experiences you’ve had, and probably some that lead you to wonder, “Why did she do THAT? I’d have done this…”. That, too, is a lot like life. Whether or not your own experiences track all that closely with Quinn’s, her dog-training-as-metaphor-for-life narrative will lead you to ask questions about yourself, your dogs, and your own life’s journey.

Want to Read It?

We’re giving away a copy of Follow My Lead to one lucky winnah! All you have to do is to follow these Wicked Simple rules…

1. Go visit the Follow My Lead Facebook page and Like it: http://www.facebook.com/FollowMyLeadBook
2. Leave a comment on my blog that answers this question: What is the most important lesson that your dog has taught you?
3. Make sure you leave the comment on the Shaggy Dog Stories blog. Comments on Facebook are always fun and appreciated, but they don’t count.
4. Entries close on Wednesday, September 28.

The winnah will be chosen at random by comment number, by someone who doesn’t even read the blog (and thus has nothing at stake).

What’s Next?

Carol Quinn is still continuing her journey with her dogs. You can read about her adventures on her blog. In a little while, we hope to bring you an interview with Quinn, asking her about what she’s been up to since the book was published.

Until then, enjoy this little teaser video…

Thanks so much to Kim at This One Wild Life for picking me as the lucky winnah of a copy of W. Bruce Cameron’s Emory’s Gift. I really enjoyed A Dog’s Purpose — which we are currently reading in my doggie book club. Since Emory’s Gift is about a bear, we probably won’t be able to sneak it into a dogs-only book club, but I’m looking forward to reading it.

The good folks at Forge/Macmillan spared no time in getting the book to me, and included a nice request to post an online review. Looks like Shaggy Dog Stories will share a Shaggy Bear Story sometime soon.

Thanks again to Kim for making this happen!

Poor Judith Kristen. I’m sure she has long despaired of seeing a review of My Name is Henley on this blog, but I can explain. I can’t revisit the story without blubbering. I can’t even think about the story without making sure I have a box of tissues nearby. These are testaments to the powerful-but-simple story told in the first person by a rescued Old English Sheepdog named Henley.

Most of the truly memorable dog stories end in essentially the same fashion: the dog dies, and we can’t help but mourn when it happens — for the end of the story, for the sheer poignancy of it all, for the all-too-brief life of a dog when compared against our own lifespans, and for every dog we’ve loved and lost.

I’m not really spoiling the story by telling you that Henley reaches a happy and comfortable old age in the book, and that he makes it to the last page alive. The story explores the themes of old ages and short lifetimes, but it also touches on more hopeful areas, such as karma, the kindness of strangers, second chances, and the fact that even if love can’t conquer all, it can often conquer quite a lot.

Described as a story “suitable for ages 5 to 105,” My Name is Henley follows Henley from his humble beginnings as the runt of a litter, abandoned and left to die in a mud pen in Lancaster County. Just as the muddy, mangy puppy thinks he’s reached his end, he is found, rescued, and sent on his way to a new life in New Jersey with a kindly Sheepdog lover named Judy. Through the years, Henley experiences comings and goings, blended families, friendship, kindness, and purpose. Read the book — to tell you more than this would simply spoil the story. Just buy the Kleenex first.

Although the story is partially fictionalized, there really was a Henley. Henley Harrison West crossed the Rainbow Bridge in 2010, but not before seeing his story translated into multiple languages. Henley also accompanied Judy into classrooms and school assemblies and on his book tours. Here’s a “Happily Ever After” video that includes some of Henley’s appearances:

If the book gets a bit preachy in places, it can be forgiven in the context of some of the things that happened to the real animals in the story. The real theme here is kindness — not the animal-rights definition of kindness nor the religious one, but simple empathy combined with the good old Golden Rule.

Part of the profits from sales of the book (entitled Ich bin der Henley in German) go to benefit New England Old English Sheepdog Rescue, an organization near and dear to my shrunken little heart. I don’t remember whether I’ve met Judy and Henley in person at the annual NEOESR Picnics, but it’s entirely possible.

My Name is Henley is classified as a children’s book, but it really does appeal to all ages with its simple, direct, almost unbearably happy-sad story. You can buy it from BN.com (as linked from judithkristen.com), or from Amazon. While you’re there, you might want to buy two copies so you can give one to a friend. You’ll soak the pages of your own copy.

Jane Miller already knew about the benefits of canine companionship when she began her practice as a clinical psychotherapist and licensed social worker. It took a special Golden Retriever named Umaya to show her how life with a dog — or even the simple act of touching and being touched by one — could make a huge difference in the life of someone suffering from severe, crippling emotional issues.

While visiting Jane’s office between vet appointments, Umaya began to display a talent for helping clients suffering from PTSD, depression, and other disorders. Inspired by the clients’ responses to Umaya’s attentions, Jane and her clients began to explore the possibility of working with dogs trained as psychiatric service animals.

The healing and helpful effects of these animals was immediately apparent. People who suffered horrendous trauma began to reenter the world with the help of their trusted dogs. If they suffered attacks or setbacks, the dogs were there to bring them to safety, gain their owners’ attention, and perform whatever tasks were needed to restore balance to the world.

Part narrative, part case history, and part valuable source book, Jane Miller’s Healing Companions discusses the roles of Psychiatric Service Dogs (PSDs) in people’s lives and in society. The book discusses how to select the right dog for service, how to care for that dog from the start through retirement and onward, the various rules and regulations, performance criteria and care standards from various service dog certification agencies, and so on. For me, the amazingly lengthy list of tasks that PSDs are trained to perform — classified by type of activity — was particularly interesting and impressive. The book also contains 100+ pages of helpful resources on subjects ranging from training to PTSD research to alternative healing.

If you are considering bringing a PSD into your life, or if you are a mental health professional exploring such a possibility for a client, Healing Companions is a tremendously useful source of information.

Healing Companions is published by Career Press under its New Page Books imprint. You can find it at Amazon, Dogwise, and all of the usual book outlets.

To read more about the book and about Jane, visit her Healing Companions website.

Congratulations to Sam, Monty, Aaron, and Christine over at How Sam Sees It. They have been visitors to both of my dog blogs for a good long while, and it pleases me to have drawn their number this time around. It also pleases me that Sam and Monty are Goldens, and that the header graphic on the blog is just awesome. Go see!

Anyway, Sam wins the inscribed copy of Julie Chalpan’s book Titan’s Tales. We hope that Aaron and Christine will read the stories to the boys when the book arrives.

If you didn’t win, but would still like a copy, by all means contact Julie. Remember, the profits from sales of the book go to help shelters and rescues in SC and GA.

Come back and visit us here soon. You should see what we get to give away next!

Twelve years ago on Hallowe’en, Julie Chalpan took a break from building a fence around her yard near Atlanta and decided to drop by the local PetSmart. She just had a feeling that Hallowe’en would be the day when she would meet, fall in love with, and adopt the dog of her dreams.

There he was: a skinny, 17-pound Jack Russell Terrier/Beagle mix who had been saved from euthanasia at a pound in another county, neutered, and offered up for adoption. Julie did indeed fall in love with him then, but little did she realize where her journey with this skinny dog (whom she christened Titan) would take her.

Titan’s journey with Julie and husband Keith has not been without its bumps (many having to do with Titan’s fondness for gorging on things that have been bad for him), but it has revealed valuable lessons and wonderful experiences, too. Titan has taught them about the power of empathy, the precious nature of unconditional love, and how to dog-proof the kitchen.

These experiences inspired Julie to write Titan’s Tales, a slim, softcover labor of love that contains not only tales of Titan, but also of 38 other rescued dogs. Each tale is told in the owner’s own words, and accompanied by photos.

It particularly tickled me to recognize Georgia, a Golden Retriever belonging to a high-school classmate of mine. Georgia has come a long way from the shelter in Dallas where she was discovered. She works as a therapy dog and helps mom Christy with her many volunteer activities. Daffy of Daffy’s Pet Soup Kitchen also appears in Titan’s Tales, her story told by owner Tom Wargo.

Of course the tales of these dogs and their loving families are heartwarming — how could they not be? — but another theme is prominent throughout Titan’s Tales: how each of these dog owners was inspired to give back to the universe that brought them together with their dogs. Some have fostered and adopted other dogs. Some have volunteered at shelters or for rescues. Some have founded organizations to help keep pets in their homes and out of the shelters. Some have gone on to do pet-assisted therapy. The book is not without its misconceptions, such as the call for stricter spay/neuter laws in the preface despite the multiply-documented failure of such an approach in keeping animals out of shelters — but the amount of good in the book, and in the hearts of the dog owners, is the main theme of Titan’s Tales.

Julie’s way of giving back is to donate part of the profits from sales of the book to benefit local organizations in GA and SC. The book is available online at titanstales.com, from a number of other locations, and directly from Julie at her book signings.

Would You Like a Copy?

Julie very kindly sent me an inscribed copy of Titan’s Tales for this review, and she would like to offer one to a lucky reader! If you’d like to have Julie sign a copy of Titan’s Tales especially for you, then please leave a comment on the blog and let Julie and me know why you’d like a copy of her book. Comments on Facebook, while very much enjoyed, don’t count.

Entries close on Thursday, July 14.

As usual, the winner will be drawn at random by comment number, using the oh-so-scientific method of having Greg guess a number.