Reviews

For the record, the majority of the book group really liked this book. So, there's that. And the conversation we had about it did make me appreciate it more. We talked about themes of loneliness, support, found family, and rebuilding a life. And questions like "Why do humans like horses but not rats?" (p.202) led to some good discussion, too.

But I kind of... really didn't care for most of it. Which is weird- I love animals, and I have no problem with suspending my disbelief about dogs going on shopping trips, etc. But... I felt like any kind of allegory or metaphors I could pull from the book were my own doing- l had to struggle to pull them out, they weren't given. And it felt like a whole lot of walking here, eating oats over there, here's a carrot now, etc, and not much... happening. Which I also don't normally need in a book, so I don't know why it annoyed me here. I guess I struggled with some other things, like why is the horse so naive and doesn't know she has snow on her, but she can do multiplication? And the duck has a revelation about his childhood experiences shaping his worldview..? That felt... like it didn't match the tone of the rest of the book. And arbitrarily using French terms or words (just translate the Proust title- it's fine) was weird- like when Star Trek has a character speaking Klingon when there is a universal translator at work. Okay, that took a nerdy turn, but you get what I mean.

And while I found it helpful that there was an epilogue (in that it allowed me to read it first to ensure that no animals were harmed before I read the book), I really don't like books that tidily explain everyone's happy ending like that. I'm glad the animals live- but the human endings felt a little too neat.