I really loved this account by Dean Koontz about his and his wife Gerda's adoption of Trixie, a highly-trained, three-year-old golden retriever who had to retire from a companion dog program because she had to have elbow surgery and wouldn't be able to reliably pull someone in a wheelchair to safety. Trixie was an extremely intelligent dog who made a significant impact on the lives of his adopted family and their friends. As someone who read a lot of Dean Koontz novels throughout the 1980s and 1990s, I really enjoyed reading this account of how he works (he treats writing like a job, 9-5), and how Trixie had an influence on the themes of several of his books. Like all good dog stories, this one has a sad ending, with Trixie succumbing to cancer. Reading this shortly after losing my dog Bailey to cancer was a bit cathartic, and I was surprised by how closely their cancer diagnoses paralleled each other.
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