What a great read! I found it fresh and funny, despite not being a dog person. However, there were some elements to the story that I thought could have been reintroduced later on, to make the story come full circle and to make those details more interesting and relevant. Also, I found the ending rushed, and I had hoped for a longer reunion between the main characters before the novel abruptly ended.

I picked this up years ago but it sat on my bookshelf for way too long. It was a lighter read around the love of a dog and includes a great mix of quirky characters. I enjoyed it, but it wasn't a book that will leave much of an impact on me.

Not a perfect or utterly amazing and original book by any stretch of the imagination, but! Pretty much the perfect book for me to read right at this moment. (But, for what it's worth, sitting in yoga pants and watching the Hallmark Channel for half the day was also the exact right thing for me to do today, so you've been warned.)

Man, I can't wait until I have a dog again.

I think this book was more about the main character learning to truly mourn her mother instead of being a cheeky chick lit love story. There's nothing really wrong with this, it's just not what I thought it was going to be and not really how I think the description on the back presents the story. I liked the premise of Van adjusting to life after her BFF/love of her life marries her childhood BFF and getting a dog to cope. Hilarious foibles were sure to ensue, right? Well...sort of. The dog is great and so is the attachment Van develops with Joe. I was also intrigued by the possibility of romance with Alex, the vet. But that's all this character has. When she's not attempting to mourn and come to grips with her mother's death, lamenting her life without Janie and/or Peter, she's chasing after the dog and quibbling over what Alex thinks of her. Which was also weird, since he made it pretty clear he was into her. And as cute as Louis would be in real life, in the book he was a ridiculous anti-plot device since any real issues she could have with Alex or moving were conveniently solved by Louis. Seriously? The plot was all over the place (love story? Story about coping and moving on? Story about dogs?) and therefore very weak. The characters were never in any real danger of anything and anytime the plot came close to real development, it either ended abruptly with juvenile non-communication or ended in a sobfest with the characters falling over each other to apologize. The writing wasn't awful and could be quite cute, but Joe the dog was the best part of this poorly plotted book and will be the only character I will miss fondly.

Over the past several months, I’ve become increasingly disenchanted with the romance genre, stepping away from it without much regret. But this book was a hard-drive holdover, and I’m actually glad I gave it a shot. Here’s why:

Savannah (Van) Leone has been quietly in love with Peter Clark for years. They attended the same college, but that’s where the common ground ended in many respects. Peter is well off; Van is the daughter of a women who kept house for a wealthy family in Westchester, New York. His parents hated her from the first minute, and as a romance, it never went anywhere—but not because she didn’t want it to.

On one fateful day, Van introduces Peter to Janie, the daughter of the women for whom her mother worked. Van and Janie had been solid friends growing up, but it was always Janie whose needs were met, since she was the little rich girl and Van the daughter of the hired help.

On the day of the wedding, Van dutifully carried out her obligations as a maid of honor, came home, got roaring drunk, started watching a Rin Tin Tin marathon on cable, went online, and ordered a German Shepherd puppy from a breeder in Czechoslovakia. She dropped a cool $6,000 on the dog.

The next day, now much sobered, Van is horrified to learn that a dog she had paid for would arrive at the airport in a crate the following day. She presses forward, buying puppy supplies—a dainty leash, a tiny collar—only to find that the massive beast in the crate at the airport is not the puppy she assumes she’s getting.

This, then, is Van’s story of a lovely romance between her and Joe, the clumsy but well-tempered dog, who understands foreign commands, and as long as you know those words, you can get him to obey rather nicely. The former owners were thoughtful enough to tack a list of those words along with the food recipe for what the dog was used to eating inside the crate.

But Van knows she needs to get the dog to a vet to ensure that he’s ok, and she picks one randomly out of the book. Enter Alex, the nice-looking single veterinarian who, as you already surmised, is instantly attracted to Van and she to him.

So if this book is so formulaic and so typical as a romance, why am I encouraging you to give it a try? First, because the character of Van is so wonderfully carved out here. She is all at once vulnerable, independent and strong, and above all, lovable. Granted, this is a typical romance, but there are some additions that make it better. Van changes over the course of the book in good ways. Dog lovers will be drawn to this story out of an appreciation for Joe, Van’s online dog purchase. Larkin does a nice job of portraying him exactly as the dog he is, not some anthropomorphized version of a dog.

The F-bomb falls with moderate frequency here, and there is one sex scene that is described, but not in molecular detail. But if avoiding profanity and sexual descriptions is your thing, this is probably worthy of either staying away from or at the very least being alert to those passages that might be problematic and being able to skim quickly.

Julia Whelan’s performance is stellar. She particularly seems to integrate her voice into Van and bring Van alive. I could see a book club taking this one on, because there are lots of places you could go as far as character development. The story is set during the Christmas and New Year holidays, which prove wonderful additions to the change of character that Van and others experience. It’s not a Christmas book per se, but the holidays are an important backdrop.

I did enjoy reading this book and found it hard to put down after Joe came into the picture. However, some of it seems extreme and absurd, especially after the climax came about. I'm really glad I'm not rich, and I don't have rich people problems.

I think readers can relate to Van's problem of loving someone who doesn't love you, or having that person admit she or he feels something for you a little too late. However, I'm not sure if most people can relate to Van. She's not a bad person, but she's the kind of drunk freshman girl I'd see in the dorms and just shake my head at. She does grow towards the end of the book, and there is at least a little bit of redemption.

Rather predictable but still a cute story. I'd read another by Larkin at some point in time.

Blahhhhhhh. So predictable.

I absolutely adored this book! I read the entire thing in a day. I couldn't put it down! I loved the characters and the way I felt I could relate to them.