The Dog Who Spoke with Gods
A Novel
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4.5 • 2 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
When Elizabeth, a young pre-med. student happens upon Damien, a dog being used in laboratory research on her campus, she has no way of knowing how drastically her life - and her beliefs - will be changed. Without meaning to, she slowly becomes drawn into the dog's fate and is soon torn between the love and respect she has come to feel for Damien and the sense of loyalty and obligation she feels for the medical profession as well as her father and grandfather, both cardiac surgeons.
With an uncanny ability to write convincingly about life from the point of view of a canine, Diane Jessup tells an extraordinary story of friendship and loyalty in The Dog Who Spoke with Gods. Few writers have ever shown the world of man's closest friend as clearly and movingly. For anyone who has ever loved a dog this is a must-read.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
First novelist Jessup pens an affecting but uneven paean to the pit bull in this tale of a girl and her dog. Elizabeth Fletcher, a soon-to-be medical student from a long line of heart surgeon researchers, has never had a pet, nor ever thought of dogs as anything but tools for human use, but she takes a job on campus as an animal handler and so meets a pit bull whom she later names Damien. The two bond intensely, and the dog's suffering as a research animal begins to pain her. Discovering he is actually capable of limited speech, Elizabeth determines to save him from torture, but he winds up in the clutches of Dr. Joseph Seville, who wants to capitalize on Damien's fantastic ability. At first made part of the project to keep her in line, Elizabeth is soon "locked out," so she contacts an animal rights group that botches stealing the dog and almost kills him, though he gets away and Elizabeth finds him. Cornered by Seville, the two seek escape and almost make it, but will Elizabeth pay the highest price to help her friend? Obviously fond of pit bulls, Jessup makes many good points and manages to bring Damien to compelling life. Her human characters are less interesting, though she has the dynamics of interest groups and bureaucratic universities down pat. And surely, the interpretation in human terms of another species's behavior is one of the mistakes she's trying to point out?
