Dog's Best Friend

In 1090, Mark Derr wrote a controversial article for the Atlantic Monthly challenging the American Kennel Club to cease overbreeding dogs which, in his judgment, has "led to an epidemic of genetic disorders and the loss of temperamental soundness and working ability in most purebred dogs." In Dog's Best Friend, an expanded version of his contentious piece, Derr chronicles how man's relationship to dogs was formed and asserts that many of us are unknowingly cruel friends to our canine companions. Dog's Best Friend includes a history of how dogs were domesticated; an overview of dog types; descriptions of how dogs were, and still are, trained for and worked in a variety of jobs and sports; and how overbreeding for appearance can undermine the mental and physical health of dogs. Along the way Derr addresses a number of controversies, both political and scientific, and tells compelling stories about a great many - mostly large - dogs.

A sweeping, lapidary history of our relationship with dogs. A fan of the dog for many years, Derr set out to write a cultural history of the dog-human nexus, one that touched on the emotional, intellectual, and physical aspects, the good, bad, and ugly ways we go about communing with the beasts. He succeeds admirably. -- "Kirkus Reviews", Wide-ranging and well-written... Mark Derr's book is a quirky and ever fascinating walking tour through the long history of dog human-relations. --Christine Adkins "Modern Dog Magazine" (8/30/2004 12:00:00 AM)

Mark Derr is the author of Some Kind of Paradise, a critically acclaimed social and environmental history of Florida; The Frontiersman: The Real Life and the Many Legends of Davy Crockett, and the forthcoming A Dog's History of America. His articles have appeared in the Atlantic Monthly, Natural History, Audubon, and the New York Times. He lives in Miami Beach.