Hero dogs by Janet Menzies

Dogs are amazing animals - they are brave, loyal, and can display extraordinary amounts of intelligence and devotion.  Over thousands of years dogs have been shaped and bred to fill a variety of tasks from herding and protecting, to loyal companionship, and over the past one hundred years or so those traits have been harnessed to help people with a variety of disabilities as well as people who are in need.  

Hearing Dogs for Deaf People, often known simply as Hearing Dogs,  is (in this case) a British charity that trains dogs to work alongside the deaf and hearing impaired to provide them with safety, comfort, and more independence.  Hero dogs introduces you to some of the amazing hearing dog partnerships that have come out of Hearing Dogs, including partnerships where the handler has more than one disability.  These simple little stories offer an insight into a world where the simplest of things can present huge obstacles, and where a partnership with a loyal companionship has been life altering.

Alongside these stories are glimpses into the lives of other working dogs from search and rescue dogs, to detector dogs, through to dogs working alongside the armed forces.  The range of dogs is amazing and although each story is a mere glimpse, it is enough to remind all of us about what dogs are capable of if they are given the opporunity to work.  This is a fantastic introduction to working dogs and there are some truly gorgeous photographs in the book which bring the stories and partnerships to life.

This is a great introduction to working dogs of all shapes and sizes, and while the book is about teams working in the United Kingdom, it is a taster of working dogs from all over the world.  If you enjoy this book there are plenty of books out there at the moment about working dogs and their partnerships (mainly because there seems to be a book at least every six months on the topic).

If you like this book then try:

• Emma and I by Sheila Hocken
• It's all about Treo by Dave Heyhoe and Damien Lewis
• Quake dogs by Laura Sessions and Craig Bullock
• Cowboy & Wills by Monica Holloway
• Endal by Sandra and Allen Parton
• Until Tuesday: A wounded warrior and the dog who saved him by Luis Carlos Montalvan
• A friend like Henry by Nuala Gardner
• Let Buster lead by Deborah Dozier Potter
• Thunder dog: The true story of a blind man, his guide dog, and the triumph of trust at ground zero by Michael Hingson with Susy Flory
• A puppy called Aero by Liam Creed
• Soldier dogs: the untold story of America's canine heroes by Maria Goodavage
• Finding Harmony by Sally Hyder
• Partners for life: True stories of canine heroes by Jane Bidder
• Puppy chow is better than Prozac by Bruce Goldstein

Reviewed by Brilla