Nobody's Diggier Than a Dog

Great book for any cat lover author of "Hobo Finds A Home"

What a very catchy, fun book to read! My 2 year old loves this book from beginning to end. He laughs, he likes to look at the fun pictures and he likes to repeat the phrases. And if you are a cat owner (we have two cats), the descriptions are so true that you will smile or laugh too. This is a keeper.

Nobody's Diggier Than a Dog is the charming companion of Bartoletti and Giacobbe's 2003 collaboration, Nobody's Nosier Than a Cat. If you have ever been at a loss for words when describing a dog, this is the book for you. "A dribble-drool, toilet-drink, breathy-stink dog" is one of many imaginative descriptions of this loveable family pet. Almost going unnoticed is the second story told by the backgrounds of Giacobbe's illustrations. The cartoon pictures depict the heartfelt story of a boy and his canine pal. This engaging story keeps the reader on their toes as the adjectives become more off the wall. The flat illustrations are rounded out by Bartoletti's unique, strung together word pairings. In the end the textual and pictorial stories bond, just like the boy and his dog. Seemingly simple, this book paints a picture of love, loyalty, and the naughty nature of man's furry friends.

The inventive wordplay and comedic insight into dogs' personalities amuses me, the bouncing rhythm of the text and the illustrations make this my toddler's current favorite. He spots the black cat that gets chased by a dog in the background across every page, and the illustrations are full of things he recognizes. The illustrations are also noteworthy, in that the stylized dogs on each page have facial expressions (e.g. guilt, fear, fierceness, joy) that clearly reflect the text and are immediately recognizable, yet manage to remain firmly canine. It reads like a love poem to dogs.

This is going to sound very inarticulate, but I'm not sure that there's any other way to say this: the words in this books are just cool. Some are jazzed-up and made-up to fit the bouncing cool cat rhythm of the book. The illustrations are bold and the array of cats depicted display the wide true range of feline personality. Which is what the book's about, really: feline personality, which all cat lovers know is wide and varied. They're nosy, cozy, lovey and rotten, aloof and adoring and the many wonderful opposing forces that make cats fabulous, and this book depicts that in a fun way. Best of all, this is a book that loves and revels in word play. A picture may be worth a thousand words, but when the right words are put together they are far more evocative than any illustration.