A beautiful, well-crafted tale of sweetness and hope…
A big, 9-year-old abandoned dog learns to adjust to his new life in his forever home and fills the empty space in his own heart as well his mommy’s after getting adopted in Winters’ latest following the endearing Karl’s Diary: It’s a Dog’s life. 9-year-old Charley is quite old for a dog, and he has seen a hard life. There is a ray of hope for Charley after he is found wandering in a park and taken to the Maricopa County dog shelter. Days pass, but no one looks at Charley. He watches as younger dogs come in and are quickly adopted. Then one night, Charley has a dream where a mysterious-looking chocolate colored dog with golden eyes appears and tells him that his good time has finally arrived. Soon, a couple appears and adopts Charley. Will Charley get the love, safety, and security he’s been craving for so long? After the homage to her beloved Karl, a handsome Boykin Spaniel, in Karl’s Diary: It’s a Dog’s life, Winters gives an appreciative nod to her another rescue, Charley. 80-pound, brown-colored Charley with a scar in the middle of his forehead is a somber narrator (unlike the sassy Karl) but is adorable in his own way; he is calm, affectionate, intelligent, and quick at learning new tricks. He is insecure, but is not afraid to show what he really wants. The language is a bit advanced but kids will enjoy reading Charley’s happily-ever-after story. Winters’s affecting prose beautifully details the rituals of Charley’s days in shelter and later at his forever home: we meet Charley alone and sad at the shelter wondering why no one wants him, before happily accompanying his new parents to his forever home, howling in the middle of night on his first day at his forever-home, staring longingly at mommy and daddy’s quilt and wishing for one of his own, barking at the hot-air balloon, getting his face washed with a warm washcloth, leaving with a stranger to get “service dog’ training, and finally getting his own “mommy-made” quilt as a security blanket. Winters’ expert prose combined with Toby Mikle’s softly framed pastel illustrations pack a wallop directly to both the hearts of dog-loving adults and children. This charming, accessible story will easily strike a chord with every pet lover.
A Quilt for Charley
Sharon Winters (Author), Toby Mikle (Illustrator)
Pub date October 21, 2022
ISBN 979-8359455244
Price $12.99 (USD) Paperback, $0.00 Kindle edition
