Marley and Me, John Grogan

Lorena Pugh, Yellow Yearning

(May 28) I came to this really late -- I had heard so much about it that it became one of those books you feel like you've already read before you even open it, and from the reports everywhere I was a little afraid of its being soppy and sentimental, a kind of Chicken Soup for the Dog Lover's Soul.

But my mom had a copy and wanted to pass it on. She said, "Oh, read it, it's cute."

Well, it is cute, and I was pleasantly surprised that it was not too soppy and sentimental. In fact, I'm scratching my head about the reports of how people cried over it and also about how quickly it was made into a big Hollywood movie.

For I didn't feel that I got to know Marley as an individual at all -- he was just a collection of stories about things he destroyed, and they were pretty standard stories, I thought. My dog-nephew Buster was a way more creative thief and destructive force in his lifetime. So, I'm guessing that's what made the book so popular -- people thought of their own dogs, whom they did know and love, and they cried about losing them.

I was also a little creeped out by how often Marley was walloped and allowed to choke himself on a choke chain, and by how matter-of-factly Grogan described coming home time and again to find Marley bleeding from the mouth and paws from having tried to rip an escape hatch through a wall or a metal crate in a panic. I admit I've never owned a 100-pound dog, but... geez.