The Underdogs

By Melissa Fay Greene,

Book cover of The Underdogs: Children, Dogs, and the Power of Unconditional Love

Book description

THE UNDERDOGS tells the story of Karen Shirk: felled at age 24 by a neuromuscular disease and facing life as an immobile, deeply isolated and depressed, ventilator-dependent patient, she was rejected by every service dog agency in the country as "too disabled." Her nurse encouraged her to raise her own…

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Underdogs as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

TV’s Lassie saved children from wildfire and quicksand. Real-life service dogs save entire families from the isolation and stress of a child’s incurable illness or severe disability.

Through the vivid stories of compromised kids who blossom with highly trained dogs, Greene celebrates the canine gift for understanding us humans—rooted in 10,000 years of interspecies history but ignored by science until the recent past.

This book gripped, moved, and informed me while hitting close to home. Like my own rescue mutt, many service dogs were trained by prisoners who discovered their own best selves by teaching an unwanted animal to love.…

From Rona's list on the power of loving a dog.

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