Loyal: 38 Inspiring Tales of Bravery, Heroism, and the Devotion of Dogs

Dog lovers will adore Rebecca Asher-Walsh’s book Loyal and its thirty-eight brief narratives, each of a different dog that accomplishes some remarkable feat or training. The book is a small hardback, and the stories run through a brief page or two. Asher-Walsh actually interviewed the owner or handler of each dog, and each is illustrated by several nice photos, including, of course, the dog’s portrait. The stories are heartwarming, inspirational, and interesting, and each focuses on a different accomplishment of a dog. Asher-Walsh introduces each sketch with the breed of the dog and its location. There is a huge range of subjects, such as dogs trained to sniff out improvised explosive devices, a guide dog for blind runner, a muse for a blind painter, a dog able to detect early cancer by smell, medical alert dogs, the more familiar airport security dogs, police dogs, and disaster-rescue dogs. The author includes many informative sidebars like seeing eye dog training, how to interpret different tail wagging, etc. She also adds brief descriptions of some of the breeds: origin, training tips, appearance, and temperament. Closing the book, she adds ten tests for dog training.