Notso Hotso

by Anne Fine

Why do bad things happen to good dogs?


It's a dog's life for Anthony. Not only is he lacking the respect
he deserves from the neighborhood dogs and cats, but an
skin condition has him frantic and frazzled. And just when
Anthony thinks things can't get worse, he finds himself on
vet's table. What she has in mind for him involves an electric
hair trimmer and is likely to cut away any shred of street
credibility he has left.

Accented with antic illustrations, this wickedly funny fable
about embarrassment will have young readers flinching and
laughing out loud at the same time.

Genres: Childrens, Humor, Middle Grade, Animals

96 pages, Hardcover

First published July 4, 2002

About the author

Though readers often find themselves inadvertently laughing aloud as they read Anne Fine's novels, as she herself admits, "a lot of my work, even for fairly young readers, raises serious social issues. Growing up is a long and confusing business. I try to show that the battle through the chaos is worthwhile and can, at times, be seen as very funny." In 1994, this unique combination of humour and realism inspired the hit movie MRS. DOUBTFIRE, based on Anne's novel MADAME DOUBTFIRE and starring the late comedic genius Robin Williams.

Anne is best known in her home country, England, as a writer principally for children, but over the years she has also written eight novels for adult readers. Seven of these she describes as black - or sour - comedies, and the first, THE KILLJOY, simply as "dead black". These novels have proved great favourites with reading groups, causing readers to squirm with mingled horror and delight as she peels away the layers in all too familiar family relationships, exposing the tangled threads and conflicts beneath. (It's perhaps not surprising that Anne has openly expressed astonishment at the fact that murder in the domestic setting is not even more common.)

Anne has written more than sixty books for children and young people. Amongst numerous other awards, she is twice winner of both the Carnegie Medal, Britain's most prestigious children's book award, and the Whitbread Award. Twice chosen as Children's Author of the Year in the British Book Awards, Anne Fine was also the first novelist to be honoured as Children's Laureate in the United Kingdom. In 2003, Anne became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and was awarded an OBE. Her work has been translated into forty five languages.

Anne Fine lives in the north of England and has two grown up daughters.

Reviews

[Tracie]

I just wouldn't recommend this one. As an adult I appreciated some of the word play but that was about it.

[Dest]

With the font size so big, I expected this to be on a 1st or 2nd grade level, but it's got some big words and a lot of attitude that would only be caught by a fluent reader. The story is narrated by a prissy (he wants you to call him "fastidious") dog with mange (which is GROSS). He's sarcastic and cheeky, which is the most enjoyable part of this book. It's probably best for 3rd and 4th graders who would otherwise be reading Captain Underpants or The Day My Butt Went Psycho. The illustrations reminded me of Quentin Blake, who does most of Roald Dahl's books.

[Anna Maria]

it's a dog's life for Anthony. Not only is he lacking the respect he deserves from the neighbourhood dogs & cats, but bits of him are dropping off! And just when Anthony thinks things can't get worse, he finds himself on the vets table, What she has in mind for him it's likely to destroy the tiny shred of street cred he has left...

[Emmalg]

This is a book with an identity crisis.

The book is narrated from the point of view of Anthony the dog; he has itchy skin. The plot is a little dull but my biggest issue is that it's aimed at children who yet lack the maturity to understand the sarcasm, the way Anthony makes up long, hyphenated nicknames for his owner that are there to provide the context for his own mood and the dreadful ambiguity in referring to the other characters as "she" or "her" at the start of a paragraph without providing any clue as to who walked into the room until you get to the next page.

Maybe this book can be pulled off by a teacher reading aloud to a class and stopping every 5 minutes to explain the excessively stretching vocab: "suffice", "masquerading", "fastidious", "dubious". Yes, children need to learn new vocab, but they need enough understandable vocabulary to be able to use context to decipher the new words.

My 7 year old who has steamed through Roald Dahl, Enid Blyton and a huge pile of longer, more contemporary books said it is the hardest book she's ever read. With the exception of the basic plot line, a child of her age lacks the life experience to understand the dry "humour". The style is much better suited to 10-13 year olds but the plot to 5 year olds.

I do not recommend this book.

[Nadina]

I think maybe I prefer Anne Fine's stories with human main characters to those with animal main characters, they feel better developed.
This was cute enough, but it just felt very fast.
I guess the characters didn't really appeal to me, I couldn't develop any real connection to them at all.
It's possible some kids would find it funny, but there is better humorous fiction out there, including better stuff by Anne Fine.

[Sharon Buxton]

fiction, children's fiction, dogs

[Sarah]

As an adult I really enjoyed the humour in this book.

[Hedi]

Ick. Total.
What is the purpose of this??

[Kate Hastings]

RL 650. The title says it all... notso hotso. The storyline itself is funny-- a dog with mange and his insensitive owners that shave him down to his poor skinny naked self. But the writing style is a) poor and b) British-- and between the two, bery difficult to understand. I was hoping to do a book discussion... but I'm opting out of this one.

[Marta]

This book was really bad. It's a dog's life for Anthony. Not only is he lacking the respect he deserves from the neighbourhood dogs and cats, but bits of him are dropping off! And just when Anthony thinks things can't get worse, he finds himself on the vet's table. What she has in for him is likely to destroy the tiny shred of street cred he has left...

BORING!!!

[Courtenay]

An entire story told about a dog with an irritating skin condition and annoying owners. He gets shaved into looking like a lion and finds out he can scare the neighboring cat, other dogs, even people. Voice is funny, story/plot a bit weak.

[Irishbookmammy]

A good short read for children although the death of a dog was a bit awful for the target audience age group.

[Lorna]

Told from a dog's point of view. Reading about having to shave the dog's rear end because of a gross mange-like rash makes me not want to have a dog. Cute writing style though.

[Aruna Kumar Gadepalli]

Easy and quick read for the ages 6+. This is a story of a dog who starts losing its hair. The adventures of the dog creates chaos.

[Oliver]

He was itching and at the end there was a bunny. The itching was a problem because his hair was falling off!

[Ashleigh]

It was so cute and funny to read a story from a dogs perspective.

[Christi]

Funny story told from the perspective of a "prissy" dog who gets mange.

[Ietrio]

This is a real weird story. And some ugly drawings. But hey! book publishers have to eat too.