Six top instances of dogs in literature

Claudia Dey's new novel is Heartbreaker.

One her six favorite instances of dogs in literature, as shared at Publishers Weekly:

The Dark Dark by Samantha Hunt

In the deeply funny and quietly genius short story, "The Yellow," a dog, Curtains, is accidentally hit by the speeding car of lonely, aimless Roy­­. Roy is forty-two. He lives with his ashamed parents. In a fit of self-improvement, Roy has just painted his bedroom yellow and found himself also “turned,” “fermented into something wonderful, something porous and bright yellow.” Then, he crushes Curtains. With the dog, soft and limp, “truly dead” in his arms, Roy knocks on the nearest door. He finds Suzanne vacuuming––“her exhausted life”––her house empty as her husband sensed “a certain ticking,” and evacuated the children, “leaving her alone to explode.” With very few words exchanged––some grief, some arrangements––Suzanne and Roy locate each other’s bodies. They visit “the brightness” that lies just outside of their contained, oppressively un-strange lives––and Curtains, as if such a state is contagious, “turns” in his way, and beautifully, terrifyingly comes back from the dead.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue