Book Review: A Dog's Purpose

I received A Dog's Purpose (by W. Bruce Cameron) as a gift from my wonderful Aunt Paula, who gives me a dog-centered book for Christmas every year.  I had never seen or heard of the book before I unwrapped it, and didn't want to ruin the story by reading the reviews on the back cover.  So when I started reading it, all I knew was that it was written from a dog's point of view, through several reincarnations, as he struggles to find his purpose in life.

I guess I should mention here and now that I am a sucker for anything dog related, so I might be a little biased when I state that this book was fabulous and I loved it.  I found the dog's views on everything from dog catchers and eating poop to pondering why any human would bother owning a cat to be charming.  I loved hearing human conversations from a dog's perspective, and then his admission that he only understood words like "food", "cat", "car", and "bad dog."   And I think most humans could identify with his initial worry of not finding his true purpose and his struggle to make the best with what life presents him.  I LOVE this book and, with the exception of dog-haters, would recommend it to anyone

But I do feel that there needs to be a warning on this book.  Remember how I said that the dog was reincarnated several times?  Sure, that means that you get to hear about him being a squiggly, squirmy, chubby puppy more than once.  What I didn't stop to consider was that to be reincarnated you have to die first.  It was like the ending of Marley & Me repeated multiple times in one novel, from Marley's point of view.  I think I cried about eight times.  And to be honest, it was probably more like sobbing on several of those occasions.  I couldn't find any tissues.  My eyes got completely swollen and bloodshot, and I lost the ability to breathe through my nose.  It was terrible.  It took an hour of fetch with my dogs to make myself feel better.  A day later, I'm still not fully recovered from the experience.

Despite the risks of a red nose and swollen eyes,  A Dog's Purpose is worth reading.  I haven't enjoyed a book this much since I read Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, which was probably 15 years ago.  But please consider, if things like Sarah McLaughlin's ASPCA commercials make you cry, you probably need to do a little preparation before diving in.  Make sure you don't need to go out in public for at least 24 hours after reading.  Record several episodes of Too Cute on Animal Planet to counteract side effects like lingering tears or the urge to purchase several puppies.  And definitely stock up on tissues because you'll need them.