Bound To Stay Bound

School Library Journal - 02/01/2016 Gr 3–5—Everyone has troubles—both humans and animals. Arne is too bossy and reeks of cigarettes, a mom deals with management worries, a boy gets pushed into doing bad deeds by a neighborhood bully, cats lose their homes and become feral, and a dog gets spooked by thunder and runs away. These myriad issues overlap and somehow become problems for one little dachshund to solve in Freeman's latest novel for younger middle grade readers. Jake, a struggling reader, practices reading aloud at an animal shelter. There he meets Strudel, who likes the book Chief, Dog of the Old West as much as Jake. Though the work is about rustlers and stampedes and Jake's milieu is completely urban, Strudel imagines himself as Jake's canine sidekick. Jake eventually adopts the little dog, and the two become a team. Jake needs all the help he can get when a neighborhood bully talks him into committing petty crimes for cash. Strudel has his own troubles when a band of feral cats demand that he give up his food. Some problems get solved, while others are left hanging—perhaps due to the fact that the tale is told from the dog's point of view. Strudel is an admirable canine pal who tries to help Jake make the right decisions. Jake, on the other hand, doesn't always own up to his bad deeds. It's unusual to find a children's book in which the good guy turns out to be the dog while the human is left wanting. VERDICT Give this to kids who like stories told from the animal's perspective.—Lillian Hecker, Town of Pelham Public Library, NY - Copyright 2016 Publishers Weekly, Library Journal and/or School Library Journal used with permission.

Booklist - 03/15/2016 Dachshund Strudel is not sure how he ended up in a shelter. He makes a friend in an older dog named Maisie, but he still wonders what happened to his former owner. Maisie advises him to look forward, not back, and stay true to his hound nature. When a young boy named Jake comes to the shelter to read to a dog, on his teacher’s orders, he and Strudel are paired. Strudel loves hearing the stories of Chief, Dog of the Old West, and hopes it’s forever when Jake brings him home from the shelter. But Strudel doesn’t always do everything right: he destroys a garden hose, thinking it is a rattlesnake, and is always getting underfoot of Arnie, Jake’s mom’s boyfriend. Still, his protective instincts might not be entirely off base. Told from the dog’s point of view, this is a story of a dog that needs a family—and the family who needs him back. Readers will cheer for this small dog with a big heart and dreams to match. - Copyright 2016 Booklist.

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