Another Good Dog: One Family and Fifty Foster Dogs, by Cara Sue Achterberg (Pegasus Books Ltd., 256 pages, 2018, $25.95) Listen to a sampler here.
Not Just Another Dog Memoir
The cute puppy cover and title, Another Good Dog, had attracted my notice a few times. I had seen the book cover in my friendly neighborhood independent bookstore (lucky me) but I always passed it by, thinking it was just another dog memoir, memorable, but still I needed to review a more serious dog book this week, I kept saying to myself. Many of my dog trainer colleagues do not read dog memoirs but I dearly love them and I also love reading books 'written' by dogs (also in the minority there) so I passed it by for a couple of years. Until now, when I happened to read the subtitle and - glad I did!
Once or twice a year, I read a book that is truly remarkable and, what I like to call, a 24-hour book - so good that I read it in nearly one sitting although you can easily put it down and pick it up again without losing the flow (if you carry the book with you because you won't be able to wait to get back to it).
Another Good Dog is just such a book: funny, sensitive and, about dogs!
I didn't want this book to end. I want to meet the author and read her other books*. I even took the time to peruse the website of the dog rescue she fosters for, Operation Paws for Homes**, and am considering becoming a volunteer trainer for the organization: it certainly sounds like a great organization making a difference for dogs. And, to find she only lives about 50 miles from me!
Addicted to Fostering Rescue Dogs?
Our author was ready for another dog - almost. So, she and her family decided to foster until the right dog came along. Two years and 50 dogs later. . . they were all the 'right' dogs for them but the family kept finding other perfect families for the dogs (besides them, of course). And they slowly realized they were meant to foster. They also came to realize that if they adopted one of their foster dogs, then they would not be able to foster any more (after all, their house was only so big). And they were meant to foster. Author Cara Achterberg soon became addicted to dogs. Or was it addicted to puppies? Or maybe addicted to dogs needing a temporary home?
Operation Paws for Homes brings dogs (and cats) up north to Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and DC from an underfunded and overpopulated shelter in South Carolina (among others) on a weekly basis. View the 13-minute documentary here - "600 Miles Home".
About Another Good Dog
Along with her stories and photos of her 50 foster dogs over two years***, Achterberg welcomes us into her small village, her six country acres replete with chickens and horses, her traveling patient husband whom she dearly loves, and three rambunctious teens who cry along with Mom every time they have to say goodbye to a dog. "We're running low on puppies," said the youngest teen (page 242). Thankfully, they have a resident dog who stays.
There is the dog they have less than 24 hours before he is adopted out. There is the dog who stays with them for six weeks - until the scared, shy dog comes out of his shell, and finds his forever family. There is the dog who is 'theirs' for four months. There is the dog who ate a baseball, the dog who is afraid to go outside, to eat, or to drink for the first two days.
Love Means Never Having to Say You're. . . .
Fostering rescue dogs means loving them and then letting them go, watching them leave. It never gets any easier but the light at the end of the tunnel is knowing you have made another family inordinately happy and another dog deliriously happy even if the dogs generally undergo a name change once they leave you behind. An email with photos from the forever family in the following few days seems to settle the deal and put you at ease, that you have done your best. And on to the next foster dog or two (or litter).
Style (Writing, that is)
A great book has a great storyline plus great writing, writing that shows you rather than tells you. Writing that puts you in the story so it is happening to you and around you. I call that, magic.
Achterberg has that magical writing style apparent with the first page. Although one word seems to flow effortlessly after another, I'm sure each paragraph was written and rewritten and rewritten once again. The end product is a book that will endear you to the author and her foibles and perhaps even inspire you to become involved in dog rescue.
"I loved the both. How could I not? And the risk was part of that love. It's unavoidable when you open your heart to anyone - dog or human." (page 97)
Achterberg even uses footnotes! Plus, she sneaks in bits and pieces of canine husbandry facts and other information about man's best friend, but she does this so skillfully you don't realize you are being subtly educated.
A Great Book Review
Every once in a while, a book review seems to almost write itself - this one didn't even wait until I had finished reading! It just "grow'd" like Topsy from Uncle Tom's Cabin as I read. I simply couldn't wait for the review, even as I didn't want the book to end. Fifty stories about dogs is just the right number to read in one sitting.
You Can Do It, Too!
Yup, you too can foster with a good sound organization behind you, like Operation Paws for Homes. The author includes FAQs from her years of fostering experience and the critical need to transport dogs from the American south to points up north: different cultures, different weather which may perhaps account for part of the culture differences, different ideas of spaying nd neutering (or not). . . but Achterberg also writes that "dogs are pretty understanding and more than patient with us. We offer them stability, food, safe shelter, medical treatment, and most of all - love. That's five things they may never have experienced in their lives. (page 250) And then she goes on to reveal what dogs give us in return (you'll have to read the book to find out).
To Foster or Not To Foster. . . .
Achterberg debunks the reasons for not fostering. Fostering will be the hardest, most fulfilling job you will ever do for free (all expenses paid and assistance freely given). Just do it!
And finally, Achterberg won my little old dog trainer's heart when she talks about what you need to do before fostering a litter: "Get a crate. Find a trainer. Clear your schedule." (page 242) Puppies could "easily takeover [sic] a life" [ibid] but you will love them for it.
Suggestions?
I wish I had read Another Good Dog the year it came out: it would probably have been my Book of the Year for 2018. My only suggestion would be for photos to accompany each dog-story rather than be stuck together in the middle of the book.
Read More About It: Operation Paws for Homes sounded familiar plus the logo was one I had seen somewhere so I thought and thought, then, on a whim, searched through my seven years of weekly blogs at www.DogEvals.BlogSpot.com - and found not just one but two blogs I had published about Operation Paws for Homes and their logo.
* Blind Turn (2021)
One Hundred Dogs and Counting (2020)
Another Good Dog (2018)
Practicing Normal (2017)
Girls' Weekend (2016)
I'm Not Her (2015)
Live Intentionally (2014)
**Operation Paws for Homes has a plethora of BLMs (black Labrador mixes) but also numerous hounds and even a chihuahua-dachshund mix and a bloodhound on occasion. "Lab mix was the default breed for rescue dogs with short hair, ears that didn't stick up, a curving tail and a medium-large size." (p. 181)
***more than 25 foster dogs a year at one location in Pennsylvania requires more paperwork, licenses, inspections and headaches.
Caveat: I found this book at my local county library since the copy I had purchased long ago has disappeared.
(photos from Achterberg's website)
