A Dog's Journey

I love animals but refuse to watch movies where they are the star (Milo & Otis, Homeward Bound, Marley and Me, Babe, etc.). Books are only slightly more tolerable and even then I approach them with extreme trepidation. But after finishing A Dog's Purpose, the pull to finish "Buddy's" story proved too much and I borrowed the sequel, A Dog's Journey from a friend. I still had to build up some emotional stamina, though, and it sat on my end-table for a good month before I even considered picking it up.

Having just come off my Summer of the Memoir, and not in a bury-your-nose-in-a-book kind of mood, I jumped back into fiction with the doozy of them all: Fifty Shades Darker. As my vacation approached, I only wanted to keep things light but still wanted to get A Dog's Journey back to my friend before the end of time. And I DID NOT want to be reading a dog book when I was thousands of miles from my own fur-beasts. I didn't have their comfort when I sobbing through the end of Marley and Me and I wasn't going to let that happen again.

It's a general rule that sequels are never as good as the original and, while enjoyable, A Dog's Journey, easily fell right into that category. True to its name, A Dog's Purpose tells the story of dog trying to find the meaning of his life and answer the question he's sick of asking: when will my purpose have been fulfilled? So, A Dog's Journey is just that: the journey of a dog who discovers his purpose.

In that same vein, A Dog's Journey is more of a story about the people in the dog's life rather than the dog itself, leaving me with the most important lesson of all: don't trust anyone who doesn't like dogs.

While not entirely heartbreaking as animal stories tend to be, a great deal of fun was missing from this book that was present in Purpose, and even Marley and Me, and replaced with a certain amount of anxiety, making this more of an emoti-read than it already is by nature. I did, however, manage to hold myself together until the very end.

While the characters, author, and reader got exactly what they wanted by the end, it came with some lingering questions for me. Having read the entirety of all his lives, the things he learned, the people he saved, the work he did, the love and companionship he provided, I still wasn't exactly clear on his purpose, or the reason his journey finally ended. Not to be a spoiler, perhaps it was just as a result of my own dimwittedness.

If you're me and only going to read one dog/animal book this year (although I doubt I'll even do that), I would suggest something other than A Dog's Journey. Its prequel is better, more heartwarming, light, and funny. But if I'm going to be honest and recommend a dog book, it's going to be Marley and Me. And, once again, don't waste your time with the movie.