Years ago, after I finished "How to Speak Dog" by Stanley Coren, I sent a message to the author asking him if he planned a visual follow-up to his book. He said "No," but it has always seemed the obvious thing to do, and so I'm really very glad to have found "Canine Body Language." It's a solid, real-world guide to what dogs communicate, with lots of active, often subtle examples, more so than in books like "Dogspeak." It won't, of course, make me an expert, but it has helped me figure out if my dogs are fighting or playing.

This isn't a "first person" review, if that's the term, because I didn't read the book, I bought it as a gift to a college professor who is involved with the study of canine behavior as a sideline. I can say that this person publishes a lot and is highly respected in her own field, and she says the book is just incredible, and has been extremely helpful to her. She reviews books and articles published at the post-doctoral level, so I suppose this is high praise for the quality of the book.

Very interesting! If you want to understand your dog better this is the book for you. I have been observing my dogs interact and am proud of their "native language skills". The book is easy to read and has a ton of pictures to easily convey the authors descriptions. She has a cute sense of humor and obviously loves her dogs very much, as I do! Now I can better understand them which makes us all happier.

fascinating book
Lots of great pictures showing detailed differences in dog body language.
Very helpful in understanding dogs

I recommend this book for people who already know some dog language, those who don't but would like to, and perhaps most of all to people who are afraid of dogs. The text is well-enough written by someone who does not write as a profession--it comes through rather clearly that the author is an expert in her field. There are a few substitutions of jargon for definitions which prevented my full comprehension of what she was talking about, but the author has organized the book well and provided many good photographs, so that I understood what was meant. I have been fortunate to have intuitively grasped many of the "sentences" the author discusses, but I have never been able to pick up clues of when an encounter between dogs or between dogs and people is beginning to turn sour. I usually know in time to prevent wounds, but now I will be able to tell in time to prevent negative reactions from maturing into dangerous interactions. It's going to be fun to communicate explicitly with dogs; I'm going to have to practice practice practice before I get my new dog in a couple of years or so.