Pinkerton, Behave!

My two year old was given this book as a gift, and it instantly became her favorite. We have read it countless times and she asks for it repeatedly. The story is funny, the characters lively, and the illustrations are full of fun details that entertain me as well as my daughter - which is great when I read it for the 600th time. There is a scene where a burglar comes through the window with a gun, and I admit that I was nervous that this might frighten her. But I treated it humorously, giving the burglar a kind of a silly voice, and although she asked me if it was "scary," she wasn't frightened herself. I think this is exactly what the author intended - the burglar is a very cartoonish figure, not very realistic, and almost as silly looking as the dummies that Pinkerton encounters at obediance school. If your child is easily disturbed by anything at all scary, maybe this is not the book for them. But for most kids, I think this is a wonderful book.

I got the book when I was five or six, and since that, I love him and all great danes I see. Many kids are afraid to make mistakes, and he shows that this can happen even to big, strong dogs. When a friend got a great dane five years ago, it was so nice to find so many similarities to him, so despite of their frightening utter appearance, they are very loveable and playful dogs. Comments that the book is too scary for little kids because of a bad guy entering a room with a gun is just ridiculous...worse things happen in stories of the Grimm brothers and nobody had a bad impact on their lifes so far. In case they get really upset, buy them a nice dog like Pinkerton, then they will also learn other useful things like responsibility and social behaviour.

Steven Kellogg books are my favorites to give as gifts. The pictures are marvelous and each time you read the book you see something you had missed before. I love all the Pinkerton books, The Missing Mitten, and the Jimmy's Boa series. My son (now 15 years old) loved these books as a child, we checked them out of the library again and again. As to the reviewers that are concerned about the gun, I just went and looked at my son again and so far he seems completely normal.

Loved it, great story and pictures, Just as a Great Dane Puppy would behave!

It's unfair to give this book a bad rating just because it may be a little mature for a childrens' picture book. I first read this story a couple of years ago (I was 27) while browsing through the library. By the time I had finished with the same surprise ending that has everyone in an uproar, I was in tears. The whole point of the story is that Pinkerton's misbehaving turns out to be serendipitous in the end. Anyone who has ever owned a large-breed dog (particularly a Great Dane) will agree that it's often very difficult and tedious trying to break them of their inherently energetic nature and train them not to be destructive and hyperactive. Those condemning this book for the way it turns out are completely missing the point. It's a twist of irony that leads to the happy ending--the bad habits of which Pinkerton's owners were trying to break him are what keep them from being harmed in the robbery. They end up praising him for his inability to learn commands because it saves their lives. That's how great stories are written. So, all of you namby-pamby moms out there who think this is such a "terrible" book because of its "violent" content need to settle down. It's ignorant of you to dismiss this title on the grounds that it's inappropriate for childen. As parents, it's up to you to determine your child's rate of development and decide for each one when is the proper time for them to experience a story like this. If any of you have a problem reading this to your kids, then it's your own fault for not skimming it before selecting it, not the author's or publisher's. It takes all of three minutes for an adult to read this book, so I would think that you would invest that time if you suspect a story this "intense" is too advanced for your children. Great book! Excellent story for any dog lover. I bought it and I don't even have kids. I agree that it's not for all children, but that's a subjective opinion that can't be evaluated by a book review on a website.