Man's Best Friend Bites Back! by Mr. Miller
What’s that, Lassie? Little Timmy has fallen down a well? What’s that, Lassie? He fell down there after you chewed off his leg? What the!! What’s that, Lassie? Little Timmy has fallen down a well? What’s that, Lassie? He fell down there after you chewed off his leg? What the!! Don’t worry, folks, Lassie hasn’t hurt anyone. I’m just a little dog-phobic after reading a couple killer canine paperbacks. Remember what I said back when I wrote about the killer cat books? That those creepy killer kitties are why dogs are mans best friend? Well, I was wrong. Dead wrong. Ever since I’ve read these 2 darn-blasted books, Mr. Miller has been freaking out like the Son of Sam every time a dog barks. It’s enough to make me go back to being a cat person. THE DOGS, by Robert Calder (published by Dell, 1976), is a simple, innocent enough sounding title. But like the little Lassie scenario above, don’t let it fool you, THE DOGS is one gruesome book, packed with enough maniacal mutt murders to please any horror thriller fan. In a small New England town, the top secret Behavior Development Incorporated is developing an experimental breed of canine. The Alpha Liter is the result of those experiments, a keenly intelligent breed of dogs with the shocking capability of massive, vicious aggression. And one of the dogs is missing. 100 miles away, Alex Baur, an English professor at the university, has found a cute little German Shepard puppy and has taken him home. Sounds pretty creepy, huh? The fun just keeps rolling on as Baur’s dog (nicknamed Orph) begins to show signs of not being too stable. It would get moody around people, being nice but then turning aggressive without provocation. Other times it would suddenly wail for no apparent reason, and then take off for days at a time. Things get tenser when Orph totally blows his master’s chances at getting custody of his kid from his estranged wife when it takes a nice nip at the kids face. Tough luck! Looks like no visiting rights, either!! Orph takes off again, but this time he’s not coming back. Instead, he’s joined up with a roaming pack of wild dogs, as they set out to feed their savage hunger. The textured cover art, with its faux wood-carved murderous mutts, is fantastic. And the story certainly has enough rabid, grisly action to keep any thriller fan frothing at the mouth. But the author’s well studied knowledge of all things doggie seemed to slow things down like a Weiner dog in a snow pile. Calder tends to drag on with the subplots to the point where he dedicates whole chapters to the protagonist’s marriage troubles when he should be feeding the action. When he does get down to the gruesome, he does pretty well. Check out the chainsaw fight sequence!! THE PACK, by David Fisher (Ballentine Books, 1976), is the book you need to keep on a short leash, and put up some extra strong fencing around to keep it away from the neighborhood kids. On the remote Burrows Island, just off the coast of Long Island, the dogs frolicked on the beaches, fetched sticks, and played with children all through the summer. Then the summer dwellers left, abandoning them to the harsh winter. Ravenous hunger and violent rage have brought them all together. Man has betrayed his best friend – now the dogs will have their day. (taken from the back cover) Larry Hardman wants to take a break from the city life, so he drags his wife and their young daughter and puppy to go for a snowy visit to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. Larry arrives to find the community of Burrows Island has grown very anxious, concerned about the stray dogs who seem to be killing off the wildlife. Instead of some rest and relaxation, Larry ends up squaring off with some of the wild dogs, killing one of them to protect his daughter’s life. Luckily for the plot, a winter storm is a-brewing, and when it hits - it hits bad; knocking down power, and closing off all access to the island from the coastline. The storm has sent the wildlife packing for the hills, too, so there isn’t much left for the dogs to feed on. Until they stumble upon some of the locals. THE PACK is a great suspense story, and David Fisher does a nice job layering the action with the inner personal turmoil of the protagonist. Larry Hardman not only has to deal with a pack of vicious killer dogs, who want nothing more than to rip his legs off and gnaw on them, but he has a wife who weighs heavily on his weary back, and a brother who he has an unhealthy rivalry with, and parents so stubborn that they would rather face being eaten alive than to face their family problems. Unlike in THE DOGS, these side stories don’t get in the way of the suspense, but rather they add an extra element of anxiousness. Fisher also stays away from humanizing the dogs, or giving them an agenda. He skillfully portrays the dogs as animals that react to scents and shapes, and not intelligent beings that craft their attacks out of vengeance. The dogs attack Larry’s home because they smell the scent of danger, and they want to protect themselves. And they’re hungry. Great book! I remember reading this one when I was about 15, and on vacation with my family in a cabin in the woods. The Boogey Man took a back seat in my nightmares that summer, I’ll tell you what. Check out the Pop Cereal article on where to buy paperback books, and pick up a copy yourself. Copyright 2002