A Dog Year:
Twelve Months, Four Dogs, and Me
By Jon Katz
Villard, $21.95
ISBN 0375502971

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In the company of canines

You've read The Cat Who Came for Christmas. You've probably read My Dog Skip. The in-love-with-my-pet genre is flourishing these days, but just about the last writer I expected to see on this particular shelf was Jon Katz, better known for the sharpness of his cultural analysis than his affection for animals. Nevertheless, here's Katz on dogs.

As you might expect if you're familiar with the Jon Katz of Geeks and Virtuous Reality, his new book A Dog Year doesn't traffic much in warm fuzzies, even though his dogs are, in fact, warm and fuzzy. Katz's dog journal revolves around his most troubled pet, Devon, a two-year-old border collie. From the moment Devon arrives in the airport in a crate, it's clear he is a dog with a past -- an abusive past, though even his breeder doesn't know the specifics. And he has failed at his career as a show obedience dog. Probably because obedience isn't his forte.

Confused, demoralized and frightened, Devon leads Katz on a year-long adventure that includes retrieving the dog from the roof of a cruising minivan. Integrating the newcomer into a canine family composed of two Labs named Julius and Stanley proves a challenge, as Devon engages Katz in a battle of wills, refusing to stay in the yard, running in front of cars and disregarding commands.

It's not all sheer frustration, though. There are also moments of hilarity. By claiming that Devon is a therapy dog, Katz makes good use of America's obsession with political correctness and takes the pooch everywhere -- the pharmacy, the classroom, even the coffee shop. He also regales the reader with Devon's experiences herding sheep and schmoozing with hospital patients.

Yet Katz doesn't sentimentalize his pets. He makes sure his animals are well-trained and well-mannered. They do not take the place of friends or family, he notes. And yet, though he doesn't overstate its importance, Katz says something that needs to be said about the place of the family pet in America's social structure and psychology. There's a species of tenderness that only a difficult animal -- one who is sick or has behavioral problems -- can evoke in the human heart. In A Dog Year, Katz has captured that fragile emotion.

Lynn Hamilton writes from Tybee Island, Georgia.