6 h 57 minAudiobook6 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
A dog’s loyalty is easy to praise—but what happens when danger puts it to the test?
In The Heart of a Dog, Albert Payson Terhune brings together eight stories of dogs who guard, wait, fight and forgive. Each tale places a strong animal at its center and a bond with a person at its heart. Trouble tests that bond, and courage means facing bigger animals, rough men or bad weather, sometimes at a painful cost.
Terhune knows dogs through life with his collies at Sunnybank in New Jersey. His attention rests on how a dog moves, listens and decides. These stories explore dogs as beings of character, loyalty tested by danger and time, and courage that costs something. A clear, brisk style keeps the action close and gives each tale a strong moral shape.
What you’ll discover
- Dogs with character Meet animals whose honor, pride and will make them more than charming companions.
- Loyalty under pressure Follow bonds between dogs and people as trouble puts devotion to the test.
- Courage with a cost Feel the stakes when brave dogs face threats that can leave them hurt.
- An attentive eye Notice the movements, listening and decisions that give Terhune’s dogs their vivid presence.
- Stories that move Enjoy direct sentences and short scenes that keep each animal’s choices in view.
Who will love it
Readers who love animals, country settings and stories of loyalty will feel at home here. It also suits anyone who enjoys dog shows, clever underdogs and sly humor, in tales to enjoy one sitting at a time.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A fox raises a collie pup in the wild
- The hunt closes in at the cliff
- A puppy guards a house by accident
- Chum outwits the meanest man in Hampton
- Lad must find the boy who hurts him
- An old judge faces his duty
- A swindled man and a scrawny puppy
- A boy, a dog, and a hole in the ice
- Afterword: the real dogs behind the tales
Who’s who
- RuffA collie pup raised by a silver fox, strong and cunning, who loves his foster mother with a collie's whole heart.
- LadThe gentle, wise collie of the Place who bears a boy's cruelty yet follows every command to find him.
- ChumLink Ferris's collie, who loves a chance to chase and outwits the dog catcher Eben Shunk.
- Angus McGileadA small, honest Scottish judge who adores the collie Bruce and must decide fairly between old and young.
- Jamie MackellarA poor truck driver from a family of collie keepers who works hard to buy a champion's pup and is cheated.
- Lochinvar BobbyA scrawny runt who flees into the winter woods and learns to hunt like a fox to stay alive.
- WolfA red-gold collie with a wolf's looks who is devoted to his family and tries to save his young master.
- CyrilA sly, spiteful eleven-year-old guest who torments Lad and then gets lost in a blizzard.
Formats and delivery
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- Large-print eBook
- The same book in bigger, clearer type, from the first page.
- Audiobook
- 6 h 57 min, complete, read by Lucas Linden.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 6 minutes, to read or to hear.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
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Read and hear Le Cœur d’un chien in 25 languages and switch at any time. Or read two side by side, paragraph by paragraph: the way to learn a language with a book you love.
Le Cœur d’un chien
by Albert Payson Terhune · 1924
A collie pup raised by a silver fox learns to hunt and to guard, then must choose between escape and loyalty.
Medium level5–10 hours to read25 languages
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In short
Imagine a dog who gives his whole heart to one person and never takes it back. You meet a pup raised by a fox, a farm dog who outwits a dog catcher, a champion and his aging judge, and a boy who needs his dog on a frozen lake.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A fox raises a collie pup in the wild
Then King Whitefoot II digs under his wire, and Lady Pitchdark climbs her ten-foot wall to join him. The pair vanish into the forest, and even a foxhound loses their trail.
In spring a cold rainstorm floods the den where Pitchdark has lost her cubs. Whitefoot goes out for food and returns with a fat collie puppy in his teeth, unhurt. Pitchdark feeds the pup as her own, and he is named Ruff.
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What is The Heart of a Dog about?
It is a set of seven stories and an afterword about collies and the people they love. The tales include a fox-raised pup, a dog catcher outwitted, a dog show judge and a boy in danger, all showing loyalty and courage.
Who are Lad, Bruce and Wolf in these stories?
They are collies from Terhune's Sunnybank home. Lad is the great collie of the Place, Bruce rules after him as a champion, and Wolf is Lad's son and the Boy's own dog. Treve is a real collie described in the afterword.
Are the stories based on real dogs?
Many are drawn from the collies Terhune kept at Sunnybank. The afterword describes real dogs such as Treve and Wolf, with their pedigree and kennel names. The plots themselves are told as fiction, with real touches from his kennel life.
The author
Albert Payson Terhune
1872–1942 · American novelist and dog writer
Albert Payson Terhune (1872–1942) was an American writer and journalist born in Newark, New Jersey. He lived at Sunnybank, his family's home in Wayne, New Jersey, where he bred collies. He wrote books about dogs, including Lad: A Dog (1919) and The Heart of a Dog (1924).
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