Plague Dogs

Rating:
Summary: Brilliant--with a wonderfully constructed ending
Review: "The Plague Dogs" isn't nearly as accessible as "Watership Down" & it's not a children's book. Don't start reading Adams with this book--start with "Watership Down." ... Some of the dialect (especially that of the Tod) will be very difficult for American readers (though it was slightly toned down for American editions) & it's perhaps hard to follow if you've never heard the real thing, but even it is brilliant. I have heard the real thing & Adams captures it perfectly. It works best if you read it quickly. ... Adams does some wonderful experimentation with the writing in the book, experimentation that draws on a vast literary heritage & demonstrates very wide reading, experimentation that is itself a tribute to his literary forefathers. ... The characters, especially the canine ones, are very well-drawn (I'm tempted to call my next dog Rowf). ... Good plot twists, evocative geographical description, a singularly haunting passage about a ghost, great description of snow. ... The animal experimentation theme is very well done, not overstated (all of the experiments Adams described were real) & while it's obvious where Adams stands, he has the guts to balance the debate with an unexpected portrait of a dying child. ... The true brilliance of this book lies in the ending, which is just an absolute work of art, drawing together narrative strings, switching narrative styles, switching points of view, speeding up & slowing down (& even incorporating the author's tribute to his own friends without becoming excessively idiosyncratic) until it becomes positively lyrical. The book is worth it for the ending alone ... & Adams is a master of making the incredible credible so we willingly suspend disbelief ... maybe because Rowf & Snitter are so well portrayed we sorely want them to live. Not an easy read, but SO good.

Rating:
Summary: Richard Adams at his quirkiest
Review: Many reviewers here have found this a difficult read and it is that especially if you don't enjoy dialects that aren't your own. It is a very British book and no apologies are necessary for that.

Many have either loved or hated the didactic theme of the book regarding animal experimentation, but it is really about much more than that. The overriding theme of this book is that of the relationship between humans and other animals. Adams is not ranting here. He doesn't offer any facile conclusions other than that life deserves respect.

Like Adams' other works, once you become acquainted with the characters, the narrative is compelling in the extreme and all the characters are kept interesting and multi-dimensional. The work depends on your caring about the two dogs' fate and here ultimately succeeds. I wasn't moved to tears here, but I did gasp at Adam's sheer narrative audacity towards the end of the book. He pulls out quite a few postmodern stops (and a bit of deus ex machina) but still manages to guide the reader into almost believing, but certainly caring about the ending.

The only aspect of this novel that bothered me was that occasionally the author let his judgmentalism peep through an otherwise fair-minded narrative. For example, at times he feels it necessary to denigrate all anti-establishment radical types while sanctifying "honest" establishment types such as soldiers and christians in order to defuse criticism his arguably radically anti-establishment point of view regarding animal experimentation. This struck me as a sour note in an otherwise high-minded and otherwise successful satirical narrative, though you can tell that his natural impulse is not to rely on one-dimensional characterisations

Overall, I would rate this book's success slightly below that of Watership Down and Shardik among the works by Adams that I have had the pleasure to read, but I highly recommend it nevertheless.

Rating:
Summary: Good ...
Review: I found the book very slow. Infact I stop reading it altoghter. I thought it was another Watership Down. Dont get me wrong I did enjoy it once I got done reading the book. The books starts out slow but is slowly begins to pick up. The book is well set in which he gives wonderful descriptions of places, smells, (hey, half the plants and flowers I have never heard of)and locations. Like many of his books this one deals with man vs nature. The heros two dogs are living off their wits. One is a dreamer who feels that there is love in every mans heart and the other is truth, who knows what man is capable of doing. This book is well worth the time and the read.

Rating:
Summary: Richard Adams is one of the great writers of this generation
Review: I read "The Plague Dogs" after I'd read "Watership Down," which is also written by Richard Adams. And while perhaps "The Plague Dogs" is a bit more difficult of a read than "Watership Down," and may lack the narrative flow of his first book, it is a tremendous novel, nonetheless. His central characters, two fugitive dogs from a testing laboratory named Rowf and Snitter, are distinctly drawn and reminiscent of some of the great tragic characters in English Literature. Their flight from captivity will draw you in from the moment they escape the laboratory, and will continue to hold you breathless as they ellude their captors and seek a new master. The novel works on two levels: both as a commentary on the mistreatment and abuse of animals in laboratories, as well as a look at humans from an animal's point of view. Be warned, however, you may not like what you see. On a negative note, the author often slips into a confusing slang, common to the area in which the novel takes place, when creating dialogue for certain characters like the lab workers and the Tod. At times, the lingo can become tedious and the reader may be tempted to skim over it. Also, the background information leading up to the introduction of Digby Driver midway through the novel can seem unnecessary; however, skipping over these aforementioned parts only denies the reader essential information and dilutes the novel from the author's translucent vision. With that said, Mr. Adams is at his lyrical best when the story focuses on the dogs and away from their human counterparts. Mr. Adams's ability to write from an animal's perspective remains unchallenged in fiction today. Not only is Mr. Adams a gifted storty-teller, but his mastery of the English language is hypnotic. "The Plague Dogs" and "Watership Down" are two masterpieces of modern literature that will haunt the reader long after the final page has been read. On my best day I aspire to be as human as a character in a Richard Adams novel.

Rating:
Summary: RICHARD ADAMS' MASTERPIECE
Review: From the author of "Watership Down", this book is a hidden literary treasure -- a work of absolute genius.

The main complaint of this book -- that the intense and often wordy descriptions make it unreadable -- is valid, but ultimately insignificant. Victor Hugo, author of such classics as "Les Miserables" and "The Hunchback of Notre Dame" is the master of extraneous description, and makes Adams look positively concise. Get past the first forty pages or so, and you may actually enjoy the peaceful reflections as a break from the challenging work as a whole. Trust me. You'll be glad you persevered.

For "The Plague Dogs" is no ordinary novel. Wrapped in its relatively simple premise of two dogs escaping from a cruel research facility is an extraordinary study and breakdown of everything that is wrong with Human society. Adams exposes the darkest machinations of the media and the social orders, revealing the manipulative strings attached to every facet of Human life and how they are pulled. We are witness to how sensasionalism and perception reshape mass reality, and how innocent lives and souls become swallowed by the bloated machine we have created to act as our ruling bodies, and the motivations behind these acts. This is an unbelievably perceptive, enlightening creation.

As a balance, Adams details the proper nature of things, and the harmony of nature. And what truly impressed me was the time he spend analyzing all sides of the issues he explores, remaining unbiased or fanatical.

Add suspense, adventure, humor, bitter irony, GREAT characters... And the ending ... you'll be afraid to breath for several chapters; the suspense is so intense. The brilliant resolution makes no compromises. You'll be sweating by the time it's all over.

In short, this book is Adams' masterpiece. Read it ... truly READ it, and you will grow from the experience into a more enlightened person.

Rating:
Summary: not necessarily enjoyable, but important
Review: This may not be an enjoyable book, but it's an important book. It is important because it touches on the horror of animal experimentation, which so contrasts with Western culture's professed love for domesticated animals. If you don't already boycott animal-testing companies, it will make you want to check the labels on all your products. You will want to write letters to your congresspeople after reading this book, and you will be glad that many corporations already have taken heed and ceased animal testing.

It is difficult read for a number of reasons. The poetic writing style can make it confusing as to whose mind we are hearing, and the fact that one of the characters is quite mad can also add to the confusion. Add to that the dialect used by the characters, and you will have to concentrate to understand what is being expressed.

The first half of the book is far more exciting and interesting than the second half, but it is important to stick it out to read the end.

One thing that bothered me was the author's self-referentialism. He actually refers to himself and the book 'Watership Down' in the third person. And at another point, he breaks the scene to start speaking frankly to the audience as the author. For this reason, Plague Dogs seemed amateurish next to his other works. Because of its important message, I wish it could have been a better book.

Rating:
Summary: I marked this book with post-it's
Review: "Some say deep sleep is dreamless and that we dream only in the moments before awakening, experiencing during seconds the imagined occurances of minutes or hours. Others have surmised that dreaming is continuous as long as we are asleep, just as sensation and experience must needs continue while we are awake; but that we recall--when we recall at all--only those margins and fragments which concluded the whole range of our imagination during sleep; as though one who at night was able to walk alive through the depths of the sea, upon his return could only remember only those light-filtering, green-lit slopes up which he had clambered back at last to the sands of morning."

This is just a touch of the poetic writing that Richard Adams uses to convey this beautiful story of two dogs. It is also a story about society. This is not an easy read. The reasons that this book was more difficult for me was because of the dialect that one of the dogs spoke with and also the British terms (new to me i.e. Lorry =vehicle, dust bins =trash bins), and the text is so rich it takes a slower read to digest it. I had to look up a few words, so reading this book expanded my vocabulary. Although the reading was slower, it was worth it. Very worth it. Once I was 1/2 way through I was thanking myself for keeping on, it was paying off. And by the end - I was very into it.
I have never read such a unique writing style. There is no way to describe it but to say it is art. I poured over the book with post-its marking the ingenious philosophical ideas that I'd loike to come back to to think about and discover my feelings about.
This was my third Richard Adam's novel and I am always amazed. I plan to read all of his books.
Great read. Highly recommended. Thought provoking.
Thanks for reading my review, did it help?

Rating:
Summary: Compelling but corny
Review: In all likelihood, you'll already be familiar with Watership Down when you first hear of Plague Dogs. It's a gripping tale of characters you can indeed care about-- two dogs who escape captivity, and a fox they meet (mainly). The three suffer trials and uncertainties, at turns frank, touching, or even spooky. A tale of survival. There's a strong secondary plot involving various humans, too, that is quite compelling.

Adams added a number of relatively silly things into the formula this time around, however. Probably he *indended* for these things to be rather heavy-handed and goofy, but that they were deliberate doesn't prevent them from interfering with one's enjoyment of the book. Adams' awkward and inconsistent transcription of thick scottish accents plagues much of the book. There's a reason they tell you to avoid this in fiction writing 101!

His villains, too, are rather unconvincing-- on one hand, the book as a whole tries to take itself rather seriously as social commentary. On the other, the villains' motives are intentionally made into utter caricatures.

I would scorn a lesser story for silly decisions of the author. Nevertheless, it's a great adventure, with real, and moving, character development. I unhesitatingly give it four stars.

Rating:
Summary: Difficult and disturbing, but worth it
Review: Most people who pick up this book, I am sure, will already be inclined to agree with Richard Adams on the subject of animal experimentation. I don't want to use this review as a debating piece, but I feel compelled to respond to a couple of the comments made by other readers on these pages. Firstly, while the story doesn't focus on medical research, Mr Adams has made quite clear over the years that the novel is intended to be a criticism of ALL animal experimentation. I believe that searching for a cure to human diseases by torturing and killing millions of animals every year is NOT acceptable morally, aside from the fact that, due to our vastly different genetics, animal research is only ever of limited use. And it may interest one particular reviewer to know that when penicillin was first tested on rats, it killed them (it is poisonous to rodents) so we do not owe the discovery of antibiotics to vivisection. Okay, lecture over. The novel is a very difficult read if you are an animal lover or have any degree of compassion in your heart; the descriptions of the lab in the first thirty pages are unbearable, and still haunt me to this day. Other reviewers have commented on the slow nature of the story - this is true, there are long sections of descriptive prose where little actually happens, so if you like an incident-packed read you're probably well advised to stay away. Once the hunt for the dogs gets underway, the tension does mount and the final third of the book becomes very exciting indeed. Some may feel the positive ending detracts from the message, but personally I found it something of a relief - after all, there ARE still kind-hearted humans in the world! The dialects are difficult - I'm British, but I suspect most of us found the Tod's dialogue as confusing as American readers did (if it helps, I found that reading the Tod's speeches aloud, phonetically, made them easier to comprehend). It isn't quite as good as Watership Down - which Mr Adams has never equalled in my opinion - and it certainly isn't a 'fun' read, but it's intentions are the best and, when it gets going, it WILL keep you hooked.

Rating:
Summary: Patience will be rewarded
Review: This book is considered one of Adams' weaker works. Readers will find it maddeningly moralistic, pompus and self important. It follows the intrepid adventures of two dogs who have escaped from an animal research station in the Lake Country, U.K.

But listen - I nearly threw this book across the room a half dozen times when reading it. I've seen the film, loved that, and I was determined to get through the muddy waters of the book. It was worth it. The last forty-some pages of this book are pure genius, absolutely riveting narrative. If you can make it through to the end, you will be rewarded with edge of your seat, nail biting tension. John Grisham has got nothing on this guy.

In short, read this book. READ IT! Do not skip to the end. Be prepared to hate it. I did. Act Three will leave you breathless, and isn't it all the more worthwhile when you've had to work to get to the end? I think so. Thank you, Richard Adams!