The New Work of Dogs: Tending to Life, Love, and Family
Description
In an increasingly fragmented and disconnected society, dogs are often treated not as pets, but as family members and human surrogates. The New Work of Dogs profiles a dozen such relationships in a New Jersey town, like the story of Harry, a Welsh corgi who provides sustaining emotional strength for a woman battling terminal breast cancer; Cherokee, companion of a man who has few friends and doesn’t know how to talk to his family; the Divorced Dogs Club, whose funny, acerbic, and sometimes angry women turn to their dogs to help them rebuild their lives; and Betty Jean, the frantic founder of a tiny rescue group that has saved five hundred dogs from abuse or abandonment in recent years.
Drawn from hundreds of interviews and conversations with dog lovers and canine professionals, The New Work of Dogs combines compelling personal narratives with a penetrating look at human/animal attachment, and it presents a vivid portrait of a community—and, by extension, an entire nation—that is turning to its pets for emotional support and stability in a changing and uncertain world.
Praise for The New Work of Dogs: Tending to Life, Love, and Family
“Deserves a blue ribbon . . . [Katz] does a terrific job of examining how dogs are handling their ‘new work’: serving as many a family’s nurturer in chief.”
—People
“[Katz] writes with sensitivity about human relationships with animals.”
—Time
“Engagingly bittersweet . . . Katz’s central thesis, that dogs have moved way beyond their past work, is certainly true.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“Humorous, compelling, and heartrending, this is a breakthrough book from one of our most talented and perceptive canine chroniclers.”
—AKC Gazette