Breeds Apart

A year ago I moved to South Carolina. The first thing I noticed was that every other car had a large decal of an orange paw print on the rear window. I was in heaven—I had, or so I thought, moved to a town of dog lovers. It took a few weeks for a native to clue me in that it was not a dog-paw print but a tiger foot, the symbol of nearby Clemson University. I was crushed. I am still looking to move to the utopian dog land.

Until I find my dream town, I can sit back in my recliner with my two canine pals on my lap and read a charming new book called Dogland, an ode to the dog-show circuit as well as an homage to the awesome wonder of plain old dogs, or, as the author rightly calls them, “dawgs.”