No Dogs in Heaven? Scenes from the Life of Country Veterinarian by Robert T. Sharp D.V.M.

Product Details

Synopsis

For the millions of animal enthusiasts in America, here’s a heartwarming collection of tales by veterinarian Robert Sharp that relate the joys and misadventures of being an animal doctor in small-town U.S.A. With humor and compassion, No Dogs in Heaven? portrays the great and not-so-great characteristics of human and animal nature, all infused by a lovable veterinarian’s belief that indeed, there are dogs in heaven.
Included is the telling of Sharp’s first day as a rookie veterinarian nervously preparing to inject a needle into a one-ton Holstein bull; finding a rash on a cute puppy whose lovely young owner bared her breasts to ask his opinion of a similar skin ailment; treating a vicious dog whose violent owner had stabbed it with a knife, only to treat the same dog two years later—now a sweet and gentle pet of an adoptive family; and caring for a kitten struck by a car who survived amputations of both right legs, somehow learned to walk, earned the name “Lefty,” and was taken in by a family who loved him.
In the vein of James Herriot’s compelling stories, this charming, eccentric, and comic book is sure to strike a chord with readers everywhere.

Kirkus Reviews

Buoyant, tenderhearted stories of a rural veterinarian's days and nights on the job. Sharp was a "city mouse," as he says, with a small-animal practice when he purchased a country practice in Hillsboro, Ohio, a place where large animals would be a staple. So it is understandable that he encountered plenty of hairy and comical situations as he learned the ropes. Here, in 38 vignettes, all written with an easy hand (one can imagine him as a rather soothing soul, as comforting as an old pair of slippers) and without any straining at the lead, Sharp describes with equal poise the countryside around him-an atmospheric blend of stormy nights, dogwoods and redbuds, coffee cake and milk, farms tucked away in hollows-and the practice it demands: horse work, hog work, bull work, animals big enough to kill you. There are dicey situations, like the C-section he must administer on a cow, and there are faintly disgusting ones, like the decomposing fetus he extracts from another cow, a festering mass he must saw to pieces in utero, known as a bubbler in vet vernacular. There is a chauffeur-delivered cat, and there is the age-old conundrum, worthy of being a koan: "What do you do with a trapped skunk?" Sharp liberates a swan with its feet frozen into the ice, and he scratches his head in wonder at some of his clients: "I was still trying to understand the thinking process that tells you: Go ahead, stand behind a half-ton horse wearing steel shoes and cut his testicles off with a kitchen knife." He doesn't avoid the rare acts of cruelty he witnesses, but his work is much more likely to demonstrate an animal's ability to provoke a human's capacity for caring and affection. Short, anecdotal material thatanimal-lovers can dip into with relish.

Biography

Robert Sharp, D.V.M. is a veterinarian at the Hillsboro Veterinary Hospital in Hillsboro, Ohio.