A Dog’s Way Home

A Dog’s Way Home by W. Bruce Cameron         Audio Book: 11 hours, 30 mins        Hardback Book:  336 pages              

As a puppy, Bella and her Mother and littermates lived under an abandoned house with a colony of feral  cats.   When a bunch of uncaring (expletive) (expletive) land developers and their mob of excavators and other shysters on the payroll buy the land and decide to go in and demolish the houses on the ground to turn it into a money making development – they could care less about the animals living there and send in a despicable bunch of rogues to capture and kill the dog, her puppies and all the cats and kittens without really bothering to worry whether the animals all got out or not.  A young guy named Lucas who lives across the street with his disabled veteran mother knows the animals are there and Lucas has been going over and feeding the critters and bringing them water.   He enlists the help of his girlfriend, too.    He and the wrecking crew go head to head over the animals with the law being brought in over trespassing issues, etc.   The evil ones wreak havoc and the mother dog and all of the puppies except one little female along with several of the feral cats fate are left up to the imagination but it looks real bad for them even if you try to imagine they escaped.    The little female has spent so much time playing with one of the litters of kittens that the kittens mother saved her during the massacre and hid her in safety along with her own litter.    Bella, the puppy, as she is come to know later, thinks of the mother cat as her second mother but they are still in dire straights because the land developer is relentless.   Lucas gets a woman from the local animal rescue to help him save as many of the animals that are left as they can over a few nights visit while there is legalities going on to temporarily keep the developer from going in and killing any more animals but only temporarily because the developer is hell bent for ridding the animals from the picture and buying off the local authorities to make that happen.    Lucas finds Bella and while the lady from the animal rescue argues she needs to take Bella to the shelter, Lucas has fallen in love with Bella and says she is his dog because he found her first.    While the animal rescue lady continues stating the rules Lucas is persuasive and gets his way  and takes Bella home.   The jerks aren’t finished with the rescuers, yet however.    It is such a good story and told so preciously from Bella’s point of view.   Excellent.   I highly recommend this book and the film which I plan to watch now that I finished the book.  Bella has so many adventures and endears herself to so many people and other animals along the way she endures sorrow and pain but the baby girl is resilient and lives up to her life purpose in comforting and helping everyone she meets however she is needed.  GREAT STORY.  I loved it.   Bella’s take on life is so pure and so funny and childlike you will laugh, you will cry and you will get so angry you may become an animal activist.    Do read this one and check out the film it is a true adventure story that will make you glad you got to be there as it unfolds.   Good, good, GOOD book.  J

 - Shirley J.