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Coconut's Guide to Life: Life Lessons from a Girl's Best Friend
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
March 27, 2024
Just... wow.
WOW.
For starters, I'd like to give a shoutout to Pleasant Company for writing such an excellent, insightful, timeless masterpiece. I may have read this book more than any other in my life and it only gets better with age. Like a fine wine (when stored properly, not like when you leave a bottle out overnight because you didn't have a stopper so it kinda just leaves this this despicable warmth in your mouth when you go back to drink it again and you kinda think, "Wow, my mouth feels like it's about to grow mold in here, it's so dark and warm and damp.")
Coconut is easily one of my favorite female protagonists. She commits "wrongs," but I support these errors. One of the strongest examples of this is when she tracks mud into the house. Having clearly played outside in the damp yard, she tracks in slop on her paws, leading her to be reprimanded (presumably) by her family or our author, Pleasant Company (can't get over that name — would be obsessed if I got to meet her!)
I would like to compare this incident with one of another beloved dog, Bluey, from the hit show "Bluey," which is available for streaming on Disney+. In the episode "Rain" — one of the show's finest and reminiscent of the "BoJack Horseman" episode "Fish Out of Water" — Bluey is playing outside in the rain and tracks mud into the house. This clearly disappoints her mom, Chilli, who's a hard-workin' dog just achin' for a break. Unlike Coconut, though, Bluey isn't truly reprimanded. If anything, she is rewarded, as Chilli decides to join her daughter out in the storm. Coconut, however, is scolded. Even though Coconut gets scolded, we see through the subsequent pages in the book that Coconut's life goes on and she recovers from the incident in both the eyes of her family and herself. This shows that even though there are slightly different immediate outcomes for both pups, in the end, both Coconut and Bluey can be redeemed in the eye of the reader or viewer. Bluey's mom forgives her instantly while Coconut also earns the forgiveness of her family and learns to forgive herself.
While tracking mud into the house may prompt quick criticism from fans, I encourage everyone to take a step back and re-analyze these pups. Before we slap the infamous "anti-hero" label on them, I think we need to take some factors into account. For starters, they're very young. Coconut's age is unknown, but based on her behavior, we can guess she is roughly the age of a "pup" and not a "dog." Bluey is in the 6-7 range. Since they are still in the early stages of their development, we need to recognize that they are committing crimes that are age appropriate. It's like how I used to sneak a few candy corns from the candy buckets at Target. Target no longer has these candy buckets. I imagine it's because people stole from them.
I would also like to note that Bluey attends Montessori school. Therefore, she is operating under the "learn through play" model and has been encouraged to take an independent approach to her education, exploring topics that appeal to her on any given day. Because of this, tracking mud into the house was most likely influenced by her Montessori education. If I had to guess, though, I don't think Coconut attends Montessori school. Her luscious locks are so perfectly blown out that I'm guessing she attends private school at Constance Billard on the Upper East Side of New York with Blair Waldorf and Serena van der Woodsen. She probably tracked mud into her weekend country home in Connecticut — or perhaps her summer home in the Hamptons — which leads me to infer that her scolding was perhaps appropriate. Bluey doesn't live in a mansion; Coconut most likely does. While Bluey's pads run over linoleum, Coconut most likely saunters — or traipses — on mahogany.
While both of these pups are educated in different forums — Montessori versus private school — I think both girls display desire to be messy, albeit for different reasons. While Bluey is more at peace with her sense of self within the natural world and has arguably already recognized she is "one" with nature (often considered a very advanced environmental theory), Coconut's act may be one of rebellion and attention-seeking. This represents the idea that two female characters can have different motives with similar outcomes.
So... yeah. I know this was a difficult topic to discuss. This is such a divisive issue for fans — to mud or not to mud? The fact that both stories even went for it was daring, honest, and refreshing— they took a stereotypical dog story of tracking mud into the house and turned it into a dog *victory*. I'm so tired of reading about or watching dogs who are only reprimanded for tracking mud into the house. I'm ready for complex female characters who, yes, track mud into the house, but are deemed worthy of love and affection and acknowledge that while they may make mistakes again and again, their families have unconditional love for these awesome bitches.
WOW.
For starters, I'd like to give a shoutout to Pleasant Company for writing such an excellent, insightful, timeless masterpiece. I may have read this book more than any other in my life and it only gets better with age. Like a fine wine (when stored properly, not like when you leave a bottle out overnight because you didn't have a stopper so it kinda just leaves this this despicable warmth in your mouth when you go back to drink it again and you kinda think, "Wow, my mouth feels like it's about to grow mold in here, it's so dark and warm and damp.")
Coconut is easily one of my favorite female protagonists. She commits "wrongs," but I support these errors. One of the strongest examples of this is when she tracks mud into the house. Having clearly played outside in the damp yard, she tracks in slop on her paws, leading her to be reprimanded (presumably) by her family or our author, Pleasant Company (can't get over that name — would be obsessed if I got to meet her!)
I would like to compare this incident with one of another beloved dog, Bluey, from the hit show "Bluey," which is available for streaming on Disney+. In the episode "Rain" — one of the show's finest and reminiscent of the "BoJack Horseman" episode "Fish Out of Water" — Bluey is playing outside in the rain and tracks mud into the house. This clearly disappoints her mom, Chilli, who's a hard-workin' dog just achin' for a break. Unlike Coconut, though, Bluey isn't truly reprimanded. If anything, she is rewarded, as Chilli decides to join her daughter out in the storm. Coconut, however, is scolded. Even though Coconut gets scolded, we see through the subsequent pages in the book that Coconut's life goes on and she recovers from the incident in both the eyes of her family and herself. This shows that even though there are slightly different immediate outcomes for both pups, in the end, both Coconut and Bluey can be redeemed in the eye of the reader or viewer. Bluey's mom forgives her instantly while Coconut also earns the forgiveness of her family and learns to forgive herself.
While tracking mud into the house may prompt quick criticism from fans, I encourage everyone to take a step back and re-analyze these pups. Before we slap the infamous "anti-hero" label on them, I think we need to take some factors into account. For starters, they're very young. Coconut's age is unknown, but based on her behavior, we can guess she is roughly the age of a "pup" and not a "dog." Bluey is in the 6-7 range. Since they are still in the early stages of their development, we need to recognize that they are committing crimes that are age appropriate. It's like how I used to sneak a few candy corns from the candy buckets at Target. Target no longer has these candy buckets. I imagine it's because people stole from them.
I would also like to note that Bluey attends Montessori school. Therefore, she is operating under the "learn through play" model and has been encouraged to take an independent approach to her education, exploring topics that appeal to her on any given day. Because of this, tracking mud into the house was most likely influenced by her Montessori education. If I had to guess, though, I don't think Coconut attends Montessori school. Her luscious locks are so perfectly blown out that I'm guessing she attends private school at Constance Billard on the Upper East Side of New York with Blair Waldorf and Serena van der Woodsen. She probably tracked mud into her weekend country home in Connecticut — or perhaps her summer home in the Hamptons — which leads me to infer that her scolding was perhaps appropriate. Bluey doesn't live in a mansion; Coconut most likely does. While Bluey's pads run over linoleum, Coconut most likely saunters — or traipses — on mahogany.
While both of these pups are educated in different forums — Montessori versus private school — I think both girls display desire to be messy, albeit for different reasons. While Bluey is more at peace with her sense of self within the natural world and has arguably already recognized she is "one" with nature (often considered a very advanced environmental theory), Coconut's act may be one of rebellion and attention-seeking. This represents the idea that two female characters can have different motives with similar outcomes.
So... yeah. I know this was a difficult topic to discuss. This is such a divisive issue for fans — to mud or not to mud? The fact that both stories even went for it was daring, honest, and refreshing— they took a stereotypical dog story of tracking mud into the house and turned it into a dog *victory*. I'm so tired of reading about or watching dogs who are only reprimanded for tracking mud into the house. I'm ready for complex female characters who, yes, track mud into the house, but are deemed worthy of love and affection and acknowledge that while they may make mistakes again and again, their families have unconditional love for these awesome bitches.
May 21, 2020
Great read for motivation!
August 12, 2015
A cute book from a dog's viewpoint on life.
August 24, 2013
Super cute. :)
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews