Three Wild Dogs (and the truth)
We plunge, dog-first, to the maelstrom…
from mz
My family and I are pet people, and within that frame, we’re dog people. We’ve always had what many call rescue dogs, but to us they’re just from the pound, and they’ve been dogs that have changed our lives – and now they’ve changed my writing life.
My first book of non-fiction, this was a joy from Day 1, among stories of chaos and calamity. So many bad things happened! (If I were to give this book another title, it would be Love in the Time of Chaos.)
But again, there’s so much be grateful for. We’ve been witness to the primal instincts of the natural world, but also to so much beauty. Through the lens of our dogs, there’s the story of us Zusaks as a family, as humans.
And it’s also the story of my writing, I think – I spend my life taming lawless animals.
from the publisher
There’s a madman dog beside me, and the hounds of memory ahead of us. It’s love and beasts and wild mistakes, and regret, but never to change things…
What happens when the Zusaks open their family home to three big, wild, pound-hardened dogs – Reuben, a wolf at your door with a hacksaw; Archer, blond, beautiful, deadly; and the rancorously smiling Frosty, who walks like a rolling thunderstorm?
The answer can only be chaos: there are street fights, park fights, public shamings, property trashing, injuries, stomach-pumping, purest comedy, shocking tragedy, and carnage that needs to be seen to be believed…not to mention the odd police visit at some ungodly hour of the morning.
There is a reckoning of shortcomings and failure, a strengthening of will, but most important of all, an explosion of love – and the joy and recognition of family.
From one of the world’s great storytellers comes a tender, motley and exquisitely written memoir; a love letter to the animals who bring hilarity and beauty – but also the visceral truth of the natural world – straight to our doors and into our lives, and change us forever.
final note
My family means the world to me.
Books mean the world to me.
My dogs all mean the world to me – the ones we’ve lost and the one remaining.
It makes sense that all these elements were so natural to write about, and that it came to me in such a torrent. Even the hard parts and the sad parts – all that love and carnage, the heroics and glorious tragedy. When people ask, ‘Was it hard to write the sad moments, and your dogs dying?’ my answer is pretty simple: it’s what I loved the most. It was the only way to honour them. That, and we have to feel things intensely, or else what are we alive for? Our hurting is so often beautiful, and I don’t regret any of it, not for a second.
Lastly, throughout this book, there was one essential rule. It had to survive the kitchen test. I wanted it to feel like you’re just sitting in your best friend’s kitchen, and they say, ‘Boy, have I got a story for you – and I’m going to tell you everything…’
Reuben. Archie. The Frost.
My three wild, dangerous, hilarious, loving, loyal and beautiful boys. They’ve been one hell of a story.