The Animal's Companion: People & Their Pets, a 26,000-Year Love Story

by Jacky Colliss Harvey

A New York Times bestselling author's compelling portrait of the universal human need for animal companions-from dogs and cats to horses, birds, and snakes.

In THE ANIMAL'S COMPANION, acclaimed author of Red: A History of the Redhead, Jacky Colliss Harvey turns her keen eye for cultural investigation and her remarkable story-telling skills to the history of animals as our companions in every-day life. It's a history that dates back as far as 26,000 years ago to a cave in France where anthropologists have since discovered evidence of a boy and his dog taking a walk together.

From this point forward Colliss Harvey takes us on a sweeping journey through centuries and across continents to examine how our relationships with our pets have developed, but also stayed very much the same. Along the way she shares delightful stories of the most famous, endearing, and sometimes eccentric pet owners throughout history.

Genres: Nonfiction, Animals, History, Dogs, Audiobook

256 pages, Hardcover

Published April 2, 2019

About the author

Jacky Colliss Harvey was born in the wilds of Suffolk, and grew up surrounded by farms and animals. She studied English at Cambridge University and art history at the Courtauld Institute, and putting those two together, went on to a career in the museum world as a writer, editor and publisher. At the same time, her red hair also found her an alternative career as a life model and a film extra, playing everything from a society lady in 'Atonement' to a Parisian whore in 'Bel-Ami'.

Her first book, 'Red: A History of the Redhead,' was a New York Times bestseller, and finally convinced her to write full-time. It was followed by a guided journal, 'My Life As A Redhead,' and in 2019 by 'The Animal's Companion' - an exploration of the 26,000 year love story between people and their pets. Her writing has been praised as 'quirky and deeply perceptive', and as 'witty...wide-ranging and throughly enjoyable.' She lives in London with two very spoiled rescue cats, while her partner lives in New York - so a good deal of her writing is done at 30,000 feet. Whatever her altitude, you can find her on Twitter @JCollissHarvey, and on Instagram as jackycollissharvey.

Reviews

[Katie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Parts of this history of pets were fun and charming. When I enjoyed multiple anecdotes in a row, it became quite engaging. At other times though, there were litanies of sentence-long anecdotes that were simply boring. On top of that, while the chapters were organized by theme, none had a clear thesis. I also learned very little reading this. There were interesting stories about people with pets in the past. However, most of the author's speculation about the cultural aspects of pet ownership felt obvious to me as a pet owner and came with little supporting data. To top it all off, the author included stories about truly horrific things happening to animals on three occasions. I'm knocking a star off my rating for them.This review was originally posted on Doing Dewey

[Laurie · Rating 4 out of 5]

To be honest, I don't read all that much nonfiction, and most of what I do is narrative. The Animal's Companion manages a nice balance between the author telling stories about her own pets and her experience with pet ownership and getting into a more intellectual history of the human-pet relationship through history. There's a little bit about the science of domestication and a little bit before there were reliable written records, both of which I wouldn't have minded more of, but the author's discussion of individual people (mostly upper class since they were the ones writing, mostly European) related to animals and to pets--two different categories!--and how things, over time, have changed or remained the same. I'm not sure this is the book that will convert anybody to pet ownership on its own, but they're not really the intended audience, are they? (Though one thing I will say--the book doesn't really mention allergies, which have become increasingly relevant.)

[Scottsdale Public Library]

Animal lovers, rejoice! Here's a great book that explores all the joy and sorrow of being the caregiver of a pet (large or small). The author has done an amazing amount of research into our ever-changing views of our companion animals and packages her findings in an entirely readable and fascinating manner.
Especially touching are the stories that Harvey shares about her own beloved cats and how they adapt to her and she to them. - Louisa A.

[Thea · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this on none rainy Winter's day in front of the fire. What a joy for pet lovers everywhere. From the young boy exploring a dark cave 26,000 years ago accompanied by his proto-dog companion for safety and reassurance, to today's animal companions who show our love for our animals by showering them with gifts, we are all a continuation of the generations who have seen in our pets an expression of ourselves.

[Glen U · Rating 3 out of 5]

An entertaining and interesting book that is a reiteration of what every pet owner knows already, bolstered by anecdotes and quotes from writers and philosophers through history. Not scientific, a bit dry, but compelling for anyone who has loved an animal. A good read.

[Amy Dale · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the most enjoyable nonfiction books I've read this year, what a wonderful topic to tackle, to turn the egotistical microscope humans usually use to view other species and point it at ourselves for a change! This is a highly in-depth look at people and our odd journey of making other mammals our family, or in other cases slaves. Beginning with the oldest human and dog footprints found together from 26,000 years ago and traveling to the present day the author explores the psychological aspects that created these bonds through many diaries, letters and documents and her own experience as a pet guardian. She unearths so many strange quirks of our kind, so many hypocrisies, so many illogical but emotional tangents we use to justify our relations to other animals whether for good or bad. We don't realize any of these things we're doing so it's really fascinating to have them pointed out and think "Boy that's so weird!" Why do we put up alarms, cameras and locks on our doors to keep other humans out but we chop holes into our doors to allow another species to get in as they please? How funny we are! I wish there was more books like this that study our actions in the same way books are written describing the actions of other creatures.

This is such an eye-opening read, so obviously written with a huge amount of passion and painstakingly researched with a massive note section and bibliography. The writing is professional and scholarly but avoids becoming too technical or dull, it's serious but completely captivating. I loved every page.

[C. J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really appreciated this book since I have always been obsessed with my pets, including both dogs and cats, and any other sorts of animals that I have been able to look after, and I always wondered why owning a pet, or more than one, was so important to me.
This book has answered many of my questions, in particular why people feel the need to make connections with species so entirely different from themselves and need to find ways to communicate with them in order to encourage a` response` from their animals that is mutually rewarding and potentially more preferable to other human relationships, in some instances.
I liked the fact that this book illustrates a wide range of experiences,moving back into history. Each chapter has it`s own heading, so that all aspects of human and animal relationships are explored.
This book also refers to the `Chauvet Cave`, in particular, when it discusses how long ago in our history was it when the first human and animal relationship was formed and seeks to provide evidence to support this.

[BiblioBtown · Rating 3 out of 5]

A decent read.
It was full of interesting facts and fun historical anecdotes that kept interest but the style and organization left me wanting. A bit clunky in narration; it jumped around in time, style, and POV. Sometimes this made it difficult to follow. There were times (especially in the early chapters) that I zoned out and it lost my interest. Worth skimming to get to the good points though.
There didn't seem to be a lot of depth or solid take-away that is often seen with non-fiction books of this type. It was simply a light read about being a pet owner, the cycle of pet ownership, and how that has changed though history. Like a long encyclopedia entry. Interesting if that's what you like, but not leaps and bounds in the field, and no information that is astounding to learn. Simply a collection of interesting facts and stories mixed with personal details. Light, cute, fun to read, and a decent book overall.

[Vickie · Rating 3 out of 5]

(2019) Should have been very good, but does not deal with issues in any real depth. Headlines topic and then lists various owners, mainly historical, and how they have managed that issue. Also has irritating habit of inserting adverb where none is necessary and it acts as an unreasoned comment of the authors opinion. Little reasoning in the book overall.

[Rory Scobbie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Found this book really boring. A random man even came up to me in a pub while I was reading it to tell me it sounded bad, lol. There was a few funny or interesting anecdotes but I didn’t find the writing style engaging at all. The chapters were split into themes but then didn’t seem to stick to the given theme?

[Emily Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great content, but the sentences are sometimes intolerably constructed and the organisation is lacking. It makes it really hard to follow from paragraph to paragraph. It feels like it could have done with a really strict editor.

[Joan Colby · Rating 3 out of 5]

. A somewhat scholarly study of pets and people throughout history. It was fairly interesting and arranged by topic, such as naming, so it skipped about a little.

[Chase · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little bit dense on detail but contains many stories from throughout history that illustrate the complex relationship between people and their pets.

[Jbondandrews · Rating 1 out of 5]

I wanted to enjoy this book but I found the author's language too problematic to keep reading it.