Dogs Never Lie About Love: Reflections on the Emotional World of Dogs | 
 enlarge | Author: Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson
Publisher: Crown
Category: Book
List Price: $24.00
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Rating:  55 reviews
Sales Rank: 869955
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1st
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 9.1 x 5.9 x 1.1
ISBN: 0609600575
Dewey Decimal Number: 599.77215
EAN: 9780609600573
ASIN: 0609600575
Publication Date: August 26, 1997
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Amazon.com Review
Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson was, oddly enough, pet-free when he decided to write about their key role in his life. Not to worry, though. In a trice he acquired a troika of pups (a purebred and two mongrels) and a couple of kittens. (The pussycats, alas, play only cameo roles.) In Dogs Never Lie About Love, Masson finds plenty of new things to say about canines--not that there hasn't been a plenitude of pupper reportage in the '90s. Or at least he easily articulates what some of us might already think: "Dogs feel more than I do (I am not prepared to speak for other people)," Masson asserts. "They feel more, and they feel more purely and more intensely." Often, however, he seems to be writing less about animals than humans: "In searching for why we are so inhibited compared with dogs, perhaps we can learn to be as direct, as honest, as straightforward, and especially as intense in our feelings as dogs are." But this book is not just a cozy mix of navel gazing (bestial and human) and long, leash-filled walks. Masson offers several proofs that dogs do take the high moral road--one police pooch, for instance, refused to acknowledge his handler's attack command. A good thing, too, since Masson himself would have been the victim! In more ways than one, Dogs Never Lie About Love is a Milk-Bone masterpiece.--Kerry Fried
Product Description
Americans have an intense love for their dogs: thirty-five percent of American households owned a dog in 1994, representing a dog population of more than 52 million. "It hardly seems worth asking the question of why we love them," writes noted psychoanalyst Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson. "We love dogs because they love us, unconditionally. No matter how we treat them, what we do to them, how little attention we pay to them, they are eager to please us, eager to be with us." In Dogs Never Lie About Love, the New York Times best-selling author of When Elephants Weep shifts his attention from the jungle to the living room to explore the exotic and unchartered territory of dog emotion.
Why do dogs bark?
Why don't cats and dogs "fight like cats and dogs"?
Do some dogs commit suicide from despair?
Drawing from scientific studies, legends and literature, and from the stories of dog trainers and lovers around the world, Dogs Never Lie About Love raises our level of consciousness to the rich and fascinating world of canine emotion. The book demonstrates how our affection for dogs is similar to our love of children - how both live and feel in the present, and how children and (especially) dogs are eager to offer us unconditional love. Most poignantly, however, Dogs Never Lie About Love, reveals that although dogs exhibit a wide range of observable emotions, love is their master emotion and is what guides and defines their existence. In this provocative work, Masson sweeps aside old prejudices on animal behavior and challenges scientists to resist dismissing the claim of canine emotion as anthropomorphism (assigning human characteristics to nonhumans) unless they are able to prove that dogs are emotionless animals.
Heartwarming, inspiring, and always entertaining, Dogs Never Lie About Love is a compelling journey into the lives of dogs, told eloquently through the observations and experiences of Masson's own three dogs Sasha, Sima, and Rani whose delightful and sometimes odd behavior provides the means to exploring a wide range of subjects: from emotions like gratitude, compassion, loneliness, and disappointment to speculating about what dogs dream, how they perceive humans and other species, and how their powerful sense of smell greatly influences their memory and experience of reality (humans have about 5 million olfactory cells, whereas dogs have up to 220 million.) Dogs Never Lie About Love discusses why dogs are not finicky at the dinner bowl, why no breed is aggressive by nature, and the emotional significance of tail wagging.
Dogs Never Lie About Love will captivate readers with its inquisitive, playful, and serious sides, giving readers a new understanding of the hidden world of dog emotion. With compelling dog stories from around the world, Dogs Never Lie About Love offers long-overdue pause for thought about humanity's best and most loyal friend.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 50 more reviews...
 Dogs Never Lie About Love Simply Outstanding! November 11, 2008
Harry Meeth
Dogs Never Lie about Love is a truly outstanding insight into the unique personality traits and emotions of dogs, particularly their need for human companionship and seemingly limitless capacity for love of their owners for love's own sake. It also describes the many things we can learn from our dogs to change our own behavior--unconditional love, patience, loyalty, gratitude, joy, living in the present moment, and, of course, affection--just to name a few. I've had dogs all my life and thought that I knew something about them. While some of my observations were confirmed, I learned a whole lot. This book is a must read for all dog lovers and those who would like to be one.
 Worth reading for any dog lover or person thinking of owning a dog August 22, 2008
Julie Bolitho
This is a wonderful book full of the life the embodies the love of the dog. Unfortunately, I felt the last few chapters of the book fell apart and were not as cohesive as the other chapters. It was unfortunate--almost felt like the author was making a deadline.
Nails it February 23, 2008
Born to Read (Eastern USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Author really demonstrates his knowledge of an appreciation for the love that dogs give unconditionally and fully. He nails it with insights, evidence, and examples. I don't understand why some people were so critical of this book. Love is the emotion. They love us and we love them. We have much to learn about caring for ourselves, other people, and these wonderful creatures.
If you want to know more about the how and why of the love, take a look at the book mentioned below. I enjoyed it, too, and it provides some surprising insights and valuable, usable information. It discusses the origin and comprehensive nature of our relationships with animals, providing scientifically sound information on the love we share and the roles we play in each other's lives: The Powerful Bond between People and Pets: Our Boundless Connections to Companion Animals (Practical and Applied Psychology)
Thoughtful, Luminous Book February 21, 2008
Nico James (Philadelphia, PA United States)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Pleasurable reading with thought-provoking questions and reflections about loving non-human companions and how the attention they show us is perhaps more than a simple analog to human emotions. Well-written and concise, filled with great stories, tenderness that didn't indulge sentimentality -- I highly recommend this book.
Dogs Are Love August 6, 2007
Lee Shoemaker (Orlando, FL USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Mr. Masson writes beautifully and thoughtfully about dogs, their thoughts,feelings, habits and characteristics. I loved the book and have recommended it to many friends.
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