BEST BOOKS FOR... DOG LOVERS

THE author and broadcaster suggests key novels to help you through the trickier times in life

AS THE sometimes proud, sometimes reluctant owner of three Patterdale terriers, I have first-hand experience of the ways that dogs can enrich your life.

After my house burnt down 18 months ago, I found it very difficult to sleep in the flat we were renting. One night I broke all the rules and let the dogs sleep on my bed.

It was the first deep sleep I’d had for months. Yes, the bed was covered in hair and the air could have been fresher, but there was something immensely comforting about having three lumps of unconditional love licking your face to wake you up in the morning.

My husband wasn’t thrilled about sharing the bed with a pack, of which, let’s face it, he isn’t the leader, so they are now banished to their dog beds — but I don’t think I could have got through that difficult time without them.

If dogs are companions, they can also be matchmakers. It is after all the meet- ing between the two dalmatians Perdita and Pongo in Regent’s Park that brings their owners together in Dodie Smith’s classic 101 Dalmatians.

The humans think it’s chance, but the dogs know better.

I also believe dogs can teach humans about love. Daniel, the selfish copywriter in Mark B. Mill’s comic novel Waiting For Doggo, has been left by his long-term girlfriend. She has broken his heart, but left him Doggo, a small, rather unattractive hairless dog, who, despite Daniel’s best efforts to palm him off onto Battersea Dogs’ home, wriggles his way into his affections.

Doggo teaches him that sometimes you have to accept life as it comes, rather than always trying to win. It’s a charming story that underlines the lifeaffirming qualities of dog ownership.

Of course, dogs can also be an obstacle to love. Flush, the eponymous narrator of Virginia Woolf’s novel about the poet Elizabeth Barrett’s spaniel, is so jealous of her relationship with Robert Browning that he bites the writer’s hand.

It takes all Browning’s skill as a lover to convince Flush that he is worthy of his mistress’s hand.

As a friend who has yet to spend the night with his new girlfriend on account of her jealous dog tells me, sometimes a dog isn’t just a woman’s best friend, it’s her chastity belt, too.