Customer Reviews:
 Your Dog Wants You to Buy This Book April 15, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful
In my opinion, no one should ever even think about owning a dog before owning this book. For me, the main thrust was this: when trying to get our dogs to behave in certain ways, we keep expecting them to think like we do, when in fact, the key to success is learning how to think like they do. It's the difference between creating harmonious relationships with them or frustrating ones. This book will get you into your dog's head.
 A Good Book on Positive Dog Training February 2, 2008
This is one of the first books on dog training I read, and it got me started looking into dog training techniques. Based on the chapter "Things Timmy Never Did to Lassie", I checked out some of Hearne and Koehler's books and decided they are not for me.
My dogs have responded well to the positive training methods she recommends.
Wow! A book that will open eyes! January 13, 2008
Suzanne Clothier has written a book that will have one thinking about their relationship with dogs past and present. Her gentle approach to dog training is to be admired and learned from. The personal stories she tells throughout the book wil have you either in tears or laughter. A must read for all dog lovers and any one trying to train a more difficult dog. Suzanne Clothier is the true Dog Whisperer.
Answering a Dog's Prayers January 8, 2008
Suzanne Clothier's book is fun to read, full of wonder, wisdom, and insight! She opens her book with stories from her childhood that parents (and children like her) will appreciate. Ms Clothier is someone who sees. She shares what she sees with us as stories, observations, and ponderings. She speaks of training as teaching a dog to be attentive to the owner but her stories, better than most how-tos, teach us how to be more attentive to our dogs. Learning to train a dog is kinesthetic learning. This book is alittle kinesthetic learning for the heart.
A good book for what it is, with caveats July 12, 2007
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
This book describes, through subjective stories and sometimes rather overly sentimental and repetitious narrative, how to relate to a dog as a thinking, feeling being with a soul of his own, rather than as a furry domestic "object" to be systematically molded by force to man's will.
There's an upside and a downside to this approach. The upside is that Suzanne is clearly a person who deeply loves and cares for her animals, and she desires to inspire others to adopt a similar approach and thus obtain a closer connection with their dog on a deeper and more meaningful level. Based on the overwhelmingly positive reviews of the book here, she is largely successful in this effort. The downside is that this approach is difficult if not impossible to quantify, and as such the book is neither a manual of training nor technique, which Suzanne openly admits. If you have an interest in a specific "behavior problem", this isn't the book you're looking for. However, if you have an interest in the underlying issues and human-canine dynamics that may very well be the source of the "behavior problem", then you'll at least be well on the road to finding your answer here. And given the fact that many "behavior problems" in dogs actually arise because of our own incompetence or misunderstanding of dog psychology, many people (and dogs) would benefit tremendously by our learning to get in touch at some level with "the canine soul".
The one small criticism that I have about the book is that I think Suzanne is rather disingenuous and over-the-top in her blasting of Vicki Hearne. Given the opposite ends "A" and "B" on the scale of approaches to dog training -- with Suzanne at "A" and Vicki at "B", Suzanne's pendulum clearly swings too far to the left at times.
I say this because, all deference to doggie souls aside, they are *still* and will always be dogs. As such, their neurological systems are designed so that they learn MOST EFFECTIVELY through methods that utilize operant conditioning. As Jean Donaldson so appropriately points out in her excellent book "The Culture Clash: A Revolutionary New Way to Understanding the Relationship Between Humans and Domestic Dogs", training methods based on operant conditioning are the widest window that is open to us in this regard and thus, the ones we should use.
This is not to say that one should not also listen to what Suzanne Clothier has to teach us. Because in the end, the absolute best that you can do for your dog is to understand him not only as a thinking, feeling being in his own right, but also how to teach him in ways that he'll best understand.
The Culture Clash: A Revolutionary New Way to Understanding the Relationship Between Humans and Domestic Dogs
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