Category: Reviews

BOOKS: Vegan is love: Having a heart and taking action

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  March 2012:

Vegan is love:
Having a heart and taking action
Written & illustrated by Ruby Roth
North Atlantic Books (c/o Random House
(1745 Broadway,  New York,  NY 10019),  2011.
40 pages,  hardcover.  $16.95.

Vegan is Love delves into animal mistreatment at zoos, circuses,  marine parks and aquariums–all common destinations for schools and families.  “You do not have to be an expert to know that animals do not want to balance on balls or jump through hoops of fire,”  says  author Ruby Roth.  Roth explains that Orca whales live in the wild and asks how can we learn “from prisoners in a pool?” Read more

BOOKS: Kalahari Dream by Chris Mercer & Bev Pervan

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  January/February 2012:

Kalahari Dream by Chris Mercer & Bev Pervan
Paperback:  <http://amzn.to/vLHjhv>.  Download for Kindle:
<http://amzn.to/vYlNJk>.
Download for iPad and all other eReaders:  <http://bit.ly/sFM2Wb>.
302 pages,  including 100 photos.  $9.99.


On an overnight stay in Kuruman,  South Africa,  deep in the
Kalahari desert,  wildlife enthusiasts Chris Mercer and his wife Bev
Pervan asked about land for sale.   Purchasing a rundown 1,500-acre
farm,  in 1998 they opened the Kalahari Raptor Centre,  the first
wildlife rehabilitation center in the Northern Cape Province.
Mercer,  a former attorney who turned to farming before
taking up wildlife rehab, describes the huge renovation project that
they undertook to start the project as prolonged chaos,  but “The
transformation from the tired, degraded farm we had bought,  to the
luscious, rich parkland we now owned,  was quite extraordinary,”  he
writes.  “It was rather like buying an old tin mug at an auction,
and then finding out that it was made of pure gold.” Read more

BOOKS: The puppy that came for Christmas by Megan Rix

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  January/February 2012:

The puppy that came for Christmas
by Megan Rix
Plume Books (c/o Penguin USA,  375 Hudson St.,  New York,  NY 10014),
2011.  246 pages,  paperback.  $14.95.

___________

The title of The puppy that came for Christmas is both
misleading and ungrammatical,  implying that the puppy is an
inanimate object.  The book is not a Christmas story,  though the
puppy arrives at Christmas,  and is not a knockoff,  either,  of Fund
for Animals founder Cleveland Amory’s 1987 best seller The Cat Who
Came for Christmas. Read more

Wildlife Heroes by Julie Scardina & Jeff Flocken

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  January/February 2012:

Wildlife Heroes  by Julie Scardina & Jeff Flocken
Running Press (2300 Chestnut St., Suite 200, Philadelphia,  PA
19103),  2012.  264 pages,  paperback.  $20.00.

Wildlife Heroes co-authors Julie Scardina and Jeff Flocken
profile 40 people who do extraordinary things for animals.  Nguyen
Van Thai,  for example,  as a youth in Vietnam watched people dig up
pangolins,  a small Asian animal sometimes called a scaly ant-eater.
Prized for meat and scales believed to have medicinal value,
pangolins have become the most often poached mammals in Asia,  and
are rapidly being extirpated from much of their range.
“As I watched the juvenile climb onto the back of its mother
I was very sad,  knowing they were headed for the cooking pot,”
recalls Van Thai. Read more

BOOKS: Cat Telling Tales by Shirley Rousseau Murphy

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  January/February 2012:

Cat Telling Tales
by Shirley Rousseau Murphy
William Morrow  (10 E.  53rd St.,  New York,  NY 10022),  2011.
373 pages,  hardcover.  $19.99.

Mysteries don’t top my reading list,  but feline sleuth Joe
Grey and his crime-solving sidekicks,  two scrappy cats named Dulcie
and Kit,  are entertaining in Shirley Rousseau Murphy’s 18th novel,
Cat Telling Tales.  The action takes place in the coastal community
of Molena Point,  California,  where Joe always seems to be involved
in solving murders.  Plucky and persistent,  Joe tracks down details
and shares them with police chief Max Harper,  who makes the arrests.
In Cat Telling Tales,  fire leaves a 12-year old boy
homeless.  His guardian Hesmerra,  an older alcoholic,  is found dead
amidst the ashes.  Read more

Humane Trends: Measuring the Status of Animal Protection in the U.S.

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Humane Trends:   Measuring the Status of Animal Protection in the U.S.
Humane Research Council (P. O. Box 6476  *  Olympia, WA 98507), 2011.  Download from <www.HumaneResearch.org>.

 

Humane Trends,  compiled by the Humane Research Council, “is a barometer of the status of animal protection in the U.S.,” begins the introduction.  “This study brings together a collection of 25 diverse indicators to assess the status and progress of animal well-being,  providing a comprehensive view of animal use and abuse in the United States.” Read more

BOOKS: Our Lives Have Gone to the Dogs

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

Our Lives Have Gone to the Dogs
by Audrey Spilker Hagar & Eldad Hagar
Hope For Paws (8950 W. Olympic Blvd. #525,
Los Angeles,  CA 90211),  2010.
Free download from <www.eldadhagar.com/>.

An anonymous caller pleads with Our Lives Have Gone to the
Dogs author Audrey Spilker Hagar and photographer Eldad Hagar to help
a dog crouched beneath an abandoned house in a gang-infested Los
Angeles neighborhood.  Drug dealers threaten to kill the dog.  But
this dog escapes.  So does a kitten who appears on the scene.  They
are eventually rescued and adopted.  The Hagars are the founders of
Hope For Paws,  one of several hundred animal rescue charities in Los
Angeles whose work augments that of the Los Angeles city and county
animal control agencies. Read more

BOOKS: Animals and the kids who love them

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

Animals and the kids who love them:
Extraordinary true stories of hope, healing and compassion
Edited by Allen & Linda Anderson
New World Library (14 Pameron Way,  Novato,  CA  94949),  2011.  194
pages,  paperback.  $14.95.

Take out a hanky because some of the stories in Animals and
the kids who love them:  Extraordinary true stories of hope,  healing
and compassion choked me up. Read more

BOOKS: The Legacy of the Small-Town Library Cat Who Inspired Millions

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE,  November/December 2011:

Dewey’s Nine Lives:
The Legacy of the Small-Town Library Cat Who Inspired Millions
by Vicki Myron with Bret Witter
Penguin USA (375 Hudson St.,  New York,  NY 10014),  2010.
320 pages,  hardcover.  $19.95.

Dewey the library cat, formally named Dewey Readmore Books,
is famous worldwide.  Dumped in the book return chute at the Spencer
Public Library in Spencer,  Iowa,  on a blustery winter night in
January 1988,  the fluffy red and white kitten was adopted by the
library staff. Reeling from unemployment,  factory closures,  and
depressed property values,  Spencer found in Dewey a symbol of
resilience.  People came to the library just to meet and greet Dewey. Read more

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