Rating: 
Summary: Absolutely Enthralling!
Review: A beautiful and compelling book that celebrates dogs in all their uniqueness and glory. The book's main flaw is Thomas's tendency towards New Age pseudoscience (for instance, by alluding to animal ESP). Other reviewers also point out Thomas's irresponsibility by allowing her dogs to roam free, violating local laws and endangering their (the dogs') safety. I agree, and I'd like to add breeding to the list of complaints - as someone who studies dogs, she should know better than to allow her dogs to reproduce when millions of animals are being killed annually in shelters due to a lack of loving homes. Overlooking these obvious shortcomings, though, the book is a must-read for anyone interested in our canine companions!
Rating:
Summary: Very Interesting
Review: Despite all of the negative comments of other readers, I really enjoyed this book. It was a very interesting look at the natural behavior of dogs. It is actually one of my favorite dog books and I would recommend it to any one facinated by how dogs think, form relationships, etc. All of these other people need to relax. She obviously is an animal lover and takes care of her pets. So she let her dog cross a busy street unsupervised...get over it!
After reading this, pick up a copy of her book "The Social Life of Dogs." I loved them both.
Rating: 
Summary: The HIdden Life of Dogs
Review: I read and enjoyed this book - I also read the reviews of the short-sighted people who failed to mention THE YEAR in which the "dogs running wild" took place - I believe it took place long ago - when we didn't have neighbors living on top of each other, people driving like they can't get there fast enough, and before animal shelters became over run with overpopulation. I found the book very interesting and think that the other reviewers might have given thought to the time in which it was written - a time very unlike the one we live in now.
Rating:
Summary: mixed feelings about this book
Review: This book is interesting as one person's take on the behavior of her dogs; but certainly not a scientific study! What dog owner or pet owner isn't full of anecdotes regarding what their pet has done, or the many ways that our pets show us that they are thinking and feeling creatures? Plus, her background in studying wolves helped me to think more about the roots of the behavior of the dogs in my life. However, I disagree with her practice of letting the dogs roam free. Also, not spaying/neutering was just irresponsible, especially since she describes several unwanted pregnancies/litters; and there are literally millions of unwanted animals in this country alone. Regarding not using a leash, my own dog was roaming free in the park last year, suddenly got spooked, and ran onto a busy street and was hit by a car. The author was lucky that this did not happen to one of her dogs that she allowed to roam free. So, I tended to disagree with her practices, which I felt did not show enough concern for her animals; but her insights were interesting to consider.
Rating:
Summary: The HIdden Life of Dogs
Review: I read and enjoyed this book - I also read the reviews of the short-sighted people who failed to mention THE YEAR in which the "dogs running wild" took place - I believe it took place long ago - when we didn't have neighbors living on top of each other, people driving like they can't get there fast enough, and before animal shelters became over run with overpopulation. I found the book very interesting and think that the other reviewers might have given thought to the time in which it was written - a time very unlike the one we live in now.
Rating: 
Summary: Should be called "A portrait of the irresponsible pet owner"
Review: Absolutely nothing new here. Really, what could you learn from someone who thinks it is fascinating to watch her supposedly beloved dog cross the Alewife Parkway in Cambridge -- repeatedly! As she revels in allowing her "dogs to be dogs" all I could think about was: imagine being her neighbor! (which she does, in fact, imply is pure hell). Maybe if she had learned something interesting from her supposed research you could argue it was worthwhile, although I personally have trouble with the idea of potentially sacrificing great dogs to senseless research. Everything she finds enlightening has already been (better) researched and basically comes straight out of wolf research. Send in the humane society (the dog catcher has already called -- several times)!
Rating:
Summary: Spare yourself: poorly researched, ill written piffle
Review: No star, really, but that wasn't an option. Ms. Thomas gives herself away very early in the book, wondrous that a dog would cross a street without looking both ways. The most elementary knowledge, kindergarten level, of canine anatomy allows for less wonder; a dog's eyes are placed much further to the side of the head than ours, which face forward. A dog has a 270 degree field of vision. The pages which follow that street-crossing revelation, pages which I was dumb enough to read, contain nothing but twaddle.
Rating: 
Summary: The Hidden Life of Quasi-Wolves
Review: This is a fascinating examination of the behaviour of the author's own and very special pack, which is mainly comprised of huskies, the domesticated dog closest to the root ancestors of all our canine pals - the wolf. But the owner of a Dachshund or even a Labrador (now America's number one pick) will find less of relevance to understanding their companion. We follow Thomas as she ingeniously follows her huskies on hundred mile jaunts in and around the "wilds" of Cambridge. Massachusetts. We listen with great interest but a sense, mainly, of the strange, not the familiar, as her huskies are allowed to recapitulate the lifeways of their feral relatives right in the suburban back yards and city streets. As other reviewers have commented, one is constantly distracted by the thought of how irresponsible the "experiment" is of giving such latitude to any pet, let alone a breed so notoriously unpredictable and aggressive. Do we really want quasi-wolves roaming at will? In the end, despite the high quality of the writing, I personally gathered very much less than I'd expected (from the title and liner notes) towards any new insights about my "Fido".
Rating:
Summary: Portrait of an IRRESPONSIBLE dog owner!
Review: I read this book over the weekend, and it bugs me more every day. Humans have spent 14,000 years domesticating dogs; we are responsible for their health, well-being, and behavior. Marshall Thomas has neglected her duty to her dogs by allowing them to roam freely into danger, breed indiscriminantly (with disasterous results), and generally placed them and others (human and canine) at risk by allowing animal instinct to take over in an unnatural situation (11 dogs in a city house). What she has learned in the process of "observing" the behavior of her dogs is NOT worth the suffering and problems that have been caused to them and others. This book is ANNOY the heck out of anyone who really cares about their dogs.
Rating:
Summary: Get those dogs away from this woman!
Review: This little book is a riff of anthropomorphic nonsense about a group of dogs that have had the misfortune to pass through Ms. Thomas' hands over the years. This is a woman who acquires dogs "one for each member of the family," as though she were purchasing toothbrushes. She has no compunction about letting a dog left in her care wander at will over a large urban area, including crossing busy highways, "just to see where he went!" She does not believe in training dogs, but rather "lets them train themselves," and she apparently has not heard of spaying or neutering as the responsibility of a pet owner. I finished the book, but felt like throwing it against the wall more than once.
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