This new, expanded edition, with a fresh new design and new photographs throughout, preserves the best features of the original classic while bringing the book fully up-to-date. The result: the ultimate training manual for a new generation of dog owners - and, of course, for their canine best friends. The Monks of New Skete have achieved international renown as breeders of German shepherds and as outstanding trainers of dogs of all breeds. Their unique approach to canine training, developed and refined over three decades, is based on the philosophy that "understanding is the key to communication, compassion, and communion" with your dog. The importance of honest and effective communication with your dog is underscored throughout this guide, especially in the practical training exercises: a detailed, comprehensive, fully illustrated obedience course through which the monks lead you (and your dog) step-by-step. How to Be Your Dog's Best Friend covers virtually every aspect of living with and caring for your dog, including: Selecting a dog (what breed? male? female? puppy or older dog?) to fit your lifestyle Where to get - and where not to get - a dog Reading a pedigree Training your dog or puppy - when, where, and how The proper use of praise and discipline Feeding, grooming, and ensuring your dog's physical fitness Recognizing and correcting canine behavioral problems The particular challenges of raising a dog where you live - in the city, country, or suburb The proper techniques for complete care of your pet at every stage of his or her life In this new edition, How to Be Your Dog's Best Friend has been expanded to encompass the latest equipment (e.g., retractable leashes, "invisible" fences); new trends in training and care (doggy day care, professional dog walkers, etc.); and dozens of new anecdotes and case studies, drawn from the monks' own experience, that bring to life the essential training concepts. In its scope, its clarity, and its authority, How to Be Your Dog's Best Friend remains unrivaled as a basic training guide for dog owners. Like no other book, this guide can help you understand and appreciate your dog's nature as well as his or her distinct personality - and in so doing, it can significantly enrich the life you share with your dog.

    “This book touched my heart." - GoodreadsSomebody left Lee Estes in charge of the Walker place while the trainers are on the road and he manages to lose a champion cutting horse scheduled to be picked up by a buyer. The unsophisticated buyer only wants Lady Joe as a trophy horse to impress clients at a prestigious law firm, so Lee buys a cheap no-talent blue roan lookalike. When the buyer tells Lee to enter the animal in a weekend cutting for photographs, he must scramble to find a blue roan cutter to substitute for the bogus horse. By chance, the only blue roan cutter around belongs to Jim Harrison’s wife, who has no use for Lee and is about to divorce Jim. Lee persuades his best friend since high school days that there is opportunity here for Jim to save his marriage. Things go haywire from there in this humorous misadventure that takes an affectionate glimpse at the sport of cutting and becomes a trenchant comment on the future of the horse in a world where it is no longer essential to everyday life.

    From New England aquarium tanks to the reefs of French Polynesia and the Gulf of Mexico, she has befriended octopuses with strikingly different personalities—gentle Athena, assertive Octavia, curious Kali, and joyful Karma. Each creature shows her cleverness in myriad ways: escaping enclosures like an orangutan; jetting water to bounce balls; and endlessly tricking companions with multiple “sleights of hand” to get food.Scientists have only recently accepted the intelligence of dogs, birds, and chimpanzees but now are watching octopuses solve problems and are trying to decipher the meaning of the animal’s color-changing techniques. With her “joyful passion for these intelligent and fascinating creatures” (Library Journal Editors’ Spring Pick), Montgomery chronicles the growing appreciation of this mollusk as she tells a unique love story. By turns funny, entertaining, touching, and profound, The Soul of an Octopus reveals what octopuses can teach us about the meeting of two very different minds.

    But when his faithful canine partner, Argos, is killed in the line of duty, Cooper finds himself mired in grief. Jobless, on the verge of a divorce, and in a self-destructive rut, Cooper has little choice but to accept an offer for the position of animal control officer in Harmony Farms.And so he finds himself back where he started. Where his father, Bull, was once known as the town drunk. Where his brother, Jimmy, was a delinquent and bully. Where he grew up as "one of those" Harrisons. Forced to face the past while dealing with the present-including his brother's continued involvement in the drug business-Cooper does his job with deliberate detachment, refusing to get emotionally invested in another dog the way he had with Argos. Until he finds himself trying to rescue a wounded and gun-shy yellow Lab gone feral...Cooper never thought he'd find himself going back in order to move forward, yet Harmony Farms is the one place where Cooper must learn to forgive and, only then, to heal. All with the help of a yellow dog, who has a history-and secrets-that Cooper must uncover.

     Fifteen years ago, Garret Sorensen's family, trust, and heart were destroyed when Thea Celik betrayed him and married his brother. Now they are divorcing. Garret's ready to finally mend his relationship with his brother. But being back in Newport, Rhode Island, triggers a lot of memories-all leading back to Thea. Thea's not ready to let go of the Sorensens-even if it means being around Garret. As they cautiously circle around each other-finding themselves drawn together-they realize following their hearts could cast them adrift.

    His music was sure to attract the human hunters with their killing ships and harpoons. Toby would have to be banished--unless he could silence his song.But then a strange, ghostly spirit appeared, setting Toby on a quest that led from the depths of the haunted oceans to the mystery of an enslaved, sunken city. A quest in search of his true voice. Somewhere in Toby's song was a secret that reached from the seas to the stars. And only Toby's music could unite all the begins of the land and the water, to save Earth from a dark, evil creature who hated whales, hated humans, hated Nature and, most of all, hated--Dreams.

    They’re also easier to forgive. But when her mother, Helen, is injured in a vodka-fueled accident, it’s up to Geneva to give her the care she needs.   Since her teens, Geneva has kept her self-destructive mother at arm’s length. Now, with two slippery teenagers of her own at home, the last thing she wants is to add Helen to the mix. But Geneva’s husband convinces her that letting Helen live with them could be her golden chance to repair their relationship.   Geneva isn’t expecting her mother to change anytime soon, but she may finally get answers to the questions she’s been asking for so long. As the truth about her family unfolds, however, Geneva may find secrets too painful to bear and too terrible to forgive. CONVERSATION GUIDE INCLUDED

    He decided right then, at the age of nine, what he wanted to be when he grew up...an undertaker. The day he turned twenty-one, Casey joined the ranks of Morton-Albright, a family owned and operated mortuary, in the small Florida town of Angel Shoals. Immediately, he felt right at home. He seems to have a gift for embalming. The Morton and Albright families welcome him like the family he never had. The quirky and mischievous Natalie Albright is the girl he's always dreamed of. And within the walls of Morton-Albright, Casey feels a reassuring presence that calms him, like nothing ever has before. But his happiness will be short-lived if the mortuary falls victim to a rapacious funeral-home giant. With family secrets being uncovered, contested wills, and rumors of illegal funeral practices circling, the lives entwined in this funeral home become filled with intrigue, deception, and, of course, death. Bringing abundant experience and a fresh wit to the page, Miles Keaton Andrew offers a clever, spirited, darkly humorous first novel, rich with dialogue and full of nuanced characters.

    Charley Harper (1922 2007), with his masterly use of simple geometric shapes, patterns, and vivid colors, distilled the essence of each bird, bug, otter, raccoon, or elephant he painted to its most important details. He called his style of painting "minimal realism. . . . Instead of trying to put everything in when I paint, I try to leave everything out. . . . I reduce the subject to the simplest possible visual terms without losing identity, thereby enhancing identity." Harper's approach to depicting the natural world is both sophisticated and fun. This edition of Beguiled by the Wild comprises all of Harper's serigraphs produced from 1968 to 2007. The original text by Roger Caras and Charley Harper is joined by a new commentary from the artist's son, Brett Harper.

    Any animal with sense avoids the spot,' warns Sammy's mother. But Sammy is curious - about the Field, and about his father, the fierce, wild father he's never met. Then one day Sammy discovers that his father has returned. And determined to track him down, Sammy sets off towards the strange, wild land of Quatermile Field - and into a very different and dangerous world . . .

    He comes from the Gates of Death—and if he can, he will destroy the Dancer.Between them stands Duchess, last true mare of the Appaloosa line. With the Dancer, she runs away from the barns of men—but is stalked by Anor and his Harrier Hounds. If they can kill her and her foal, the Appaloosa breed will be ended.

    He wakes one morning to find that something has attacked one of his beehives, brutally killing every inhabitant. Heartbroken, he soon learns that a mysterious swarm of vicious hornets committed the mass murder—but where did they come from, and how can he stop them? If he is going to unravel this mystery and save his bees from annihilation, Sidi must venture out into the village and then brave the big city and beyond in search of answers.Along the way, he discovers a country and a people turned upside down by their new post–Arab Spring reality as Islamic fundamentalists seek to influence votes any way they can on the eve of the country’s first democratic elections. To succeed in his quest, and find a glimmer of hope to protect all that he holds dear, Sidi will have to look further than he ever imagined.In this brilliantly accessible modern-day parable, Yamen Manai uses a masterful blend of humor and drama to reveal what happens in a country shaken by revolutionary change after the world stops watching.

    Where is his boy? Will he ever return? And what will Shep do in the meantime, now that the extra bowls of food -- not to mention all those tasty things he found in the big cold box -- are gone?Then another dog shows up at Shep's window and convinces him to escape. There's food outside, and a whole empty city to explore. Shep just wants to go home . . . but the adventure of a lifetime is just beginning.

    

    But he lives fearfully, sleeping and working with earplugs, rarely going outside, drawing his life more closely around him every day. A wild parrot, a gift from his father, becomes the breach in the dike: Little Wittgenstein has a jungle shriek, fierce eyes, and a beak that wreaks havoc. David finally throws the bird out the window-and follows it into the world. His guilty search for the parrot takes him first to Telegraph Hill, where the parrot may have found others of its kind. Then David is lured to South America by rumors of an ancient flock in the mangrove swamps. There he meets the lovely levelheaded Fern, an American scientist who has her own reasons for searching for the birds. Will he retreat or follow the parrots' call?