A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World

The thing about this book is, this book gets dogs. I'm not sure I've ever read another story that captures the experience of living with one of those wonderful creatures so accurately. Most of my time reading it was spent with a small brown terrier curled up next to me, and her fearlessness, her loyalty and her love are all here in Jip.

It's a post apocalyptic story, and a pretty good one, with a different and more interesting take than the other legion of post apocalyptic stories I've read. There are secrets and twists and spoilers as well (and I'm not going to ruin them, so don't even ask - but if you pay close attention to what the story outright TELLS you it's doing, they might not be such a surprise in retrospect...). Some of it shades into YA territory, not least the central thrust of an adolescent boy leaving home and finding his own way in the world, but not strongly enough to put a grown man like me off reading it.

But yeah, it's all about the dogs. If you like dogs, this will resonate with you and you'll love it. If you don't, maybe you should read it and perhaps you will see the error of your ways.