Dog Crazy Book Review – Very Entertaining

I picture someone who is dog crazy as someone who owns twenty-plus dogs and works just so she can feed and care for her dogs, or someone who thinks of her dog more as a child by dressing up the dog and buying all the latest toys, treats, and following the newest fads. Neither of these descriptions describes Maggie, the protagonist in Dog Crazy written by Meg Donohue.

Maggie doesn’t even own a dog. But she used to. We enter the story ninety-eight days after Toby (her flat-coated retriever mix) dies and leaves Maggie with a very deep sense of mourning that leads to anxiety attacks every time she steps outside of her front gate. This is a severe problem for someone who works as a pet bereavement counselor out of her ground floor apartment. Until reading this book, I never realized such a career existed.

Much of the book is written with a sense of humor, like when her friend, Lourdes, convinces Maggie to move away from her dog-hating boyfriend in Philadelphia to San Francisco, where, “ the hippy-dippy Bay Area animal lovers would flock to pet bereavement counseling like hipsters to hand-brewed coffee shops.”

Donohue explains panic attacks so well it makes me wonder if she suffered from them. I never knew how crippling they could be, how certain triggers (like Maggie’s front gate), could set someone into a tailspin, possibly leading to physical collapse. Maggie suffers from agoraphobia, which is a fear that causes her to avoid leaving her home.

Maggie’s new client is twenty-year-old Anya, whose older brother Henry has blackmailed her into getting counseling. Anya is described as, “Her long hair, which might be auburn but is too dirty to tell for sure, hangs in front of her shoulders like a damp dishtowel slung around the neck of a faucet. Scuffed leather combat boots poke out from the bottom of the bulky army-green jacket that swallows most of her body.”

According to one of Anya’s three brothers, she is dog crazy. Anya claims that someone stole her very obedient dog, Billy, out of the house that she shares with her grandmother. Maggie, somewhat reluctantly decides to help Anya find Billy. She would help as a friend (for no charge) and not as a counselor.

In order to help Anya, Maggie must get over her agoraphobia, so she enlists Lourdes’s standard poodle, Giselle to help her cope. She tells Anya that she is training Giselle to be a therapy dog, but Anya soon witnesses Maggie trying to beat back her panic from both agoraphobia and vertigo from her fear of heights while they climb various parks at the top of the hills surrounding San Francisco to search for Billy.

Anya is a talented pet photographer but she stopped performing once Billy disappeared. As the friendship between Maggie and Anya grows, Maggie realizes that Anya can help her promote dogs for the annual fundraiser for SuperMutt Rescue, which Maggie is helping to organize.  

As you can probably guess, Anya (and Giselle) help Maggie overcome her anxiety attacks and Maggie helps promote Anya’s photography. A love story sideline also occurs between Maggie and Henry. A very happy conclusion ensues when Billy is found.

This book is an easy enjoyable read. I learned a lot about pet bereavement counseling, anxiety attacks, and therapy dogs. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. My only complaint is that the cover of the book shows a black lab puppy that did not exist in the story. The cover should have shown Toby, Giselle, or Seymour the basset-retriever rescue dog that helps bring everyone together.

Below is another review.

Have you read a good dog or pet story lately? Please share a comment.

Book Review:Dog Crazy by Meg Donohue