FTC Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher in exchange for a fair and honest review.
I love my dogs. It’s really something that’s known to anyone who meets me. I talk about them as if they were my children. I mean, my oldest one is turning 6 this year, so it’s kind of hard not to form a bond with them.
The one thing I love about my dogs — aside from the fact that they’re happy to see me whether I’ve left the house for a day, or for 3 minutes — is that they make me laugh by doing silly things. If I’m having a so-so day, Grace will pick up a circular rope toy and it’ll wrap around her head in such a weird way that she looks like a goofball, or; when Cooper was a puppy he’d watch his toy roll off of the carpet onto the scary hardwood floor, gazing longingly at it knowing he will not rescue it from its demise, or; Bailey and how easy it is to get on her nerves by doing silly things like walking backwards or singing Rosemary Clooney songs.
They’re my dogs and I love them to pieces.
When I saw Jeff Johnson’s book Things Your Dog Doesn’t Want You To Know: Eleven Courageous Canines Tell All on NetGalley, I immediately requested it because I love reading funny stories about dogs. I thought it was going to be a book that talked about the science behind what does do, but in a funny way. But really, it turned out to be more of a comedy book, with eleven different breeds telling little stories about their lives, from how they love it when you pretend to throw a ball (as a sidenote: Bailey hates this. If you pretend to throw something, she’ll get pretty mad at you.), or how if someone tries to hide poop in a corner, it will eventually be found.
I found the stories to be somewhat funny — the galley I received was just a sampler of the book, only 25 pages long, with six stories — but not incredibly funny that I would recommend it to friends of mine. While the stories are humorous, it’s always nice to talk about the funny things your own dog does, as opposed to stories about dogs you don’t even know.
That being said, some of the situations rang true – like how owners give their dogs birthday parties (as a sidenote: I have never done this for my dogs. Parties are for adults.), or how the dog is just so hungry that he will not turn down food (e.g. my little Gracie is a food monger. At least 20 times a day, she’ll check the floor of the kitchen for any food like we’re starving her.). Other stories, like the one showcased about a dog who is a drug-sniffing dog, didn’t really suit my fancy. Making it sound like the dog is addicted to cocaine and wondering what drug will be next just wasn’t funny to me.
One thing that I did enjoy was the layout of the book. I liked how it wasn’t just chaptered stories from each dog, boring text on a blah-white background, but rather, each dog got its own unique page, with different fonts, a photo of the dog, and some kind of different background to distinguish that dog. It was a nice touch.
If you enjoy humorous dog stories, you might like this book. Like I said, I only had a small taste of what it had to offer, but I’m sure — for the dog lover — there’s a little something for everyone.
