Alaska Employment Law

The inaptly named Jon Katz is an overweight, disheveled middle-aged man who has a gimpy leg, and (eventually) owns a place called Bedlam Farm in upstate New York. Mr. Katz loves dogs and loves to write about them. A Good Dog is about his relationship to a border collie named Orson, a dog so crazed that it would attempt to herd school buses in the New Jersey town where Katz lived when Orson first entered his life (leading to a comic scene in which Katz, carrying his dog, runs through backyards and hides in neighbors’ garages to avoid the police investigating the School Bus Caper).  This should not have been a surprise. When Katz first met his dog at the Newark airport, Orson sprang from his traveling crate and panicked the baggage claim area. Orson, it turns out, was originally named Devon, until a dog trainer observed to Katz that Devon might associate his mere name with his continuing spectacular failures as a sheep herding dog, and suggested to Katz that he change Devon’s name to more or less wipe the slate clean. A fan of Orson Welles, Katz agreed; it didn’t work. Orson needs to work, but he is in truth a wretch as a sheep herding dog. It doesn’t help that another border collie of Katz’s, Rose, appears to be the greatest sheep herder in history.) The only person Orson seems to understand is Katz, and their stormy relationship changes Katz’s life.

Moving to the farm (with lots of other dogs, chickens, sheep, donkeys and a formidable rooster), aided by good neighbors and a tolerant wife, Katz and Orson explore meadows, woods and the stars (Sirius was the Dog Star before it was a radio network). Katz, he realizes, becomes Orson’s work.  He loves his dog fiercely.  Orson struggles with the rest of humanity; that is his downfall. I love the way Katz writes about dogs. This is in my view a book that is far superior to the more ballyhooed Marley and Me, which seems kind of silly in comparison. If you are a dog lover, try A Good Dog (or, I suspect, any of Katz’s other books about dogs).