Top Ten Tuesday : (Wo)Man’s Best Friend
17 November 2020
Filed under Book Reviews
Tags: Fictional Dogs, That Artsy Reader Girl, Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme where every Tuesday we look at a particular topic for discussion and use various (or more to the point ten) bookish examples to demonstrate that particular topic. Top Ten Tuesday (created and hosted by The Broke and Bookish) is now being hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl and future week’s topics can be found here. This week’s topic :
Characters I’d Name a Pet After
I’ve gone for a similar or related theme – dogs in books – and of course you could use their names for your own pets.
Bulls Eye – from Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens. Bulls Eye is a great name for a dog isn’t it? I couldn’t resist the cover below with all the little snapshots – if you take a good look you can find Bulls Eye:
A very recent read – the Diabolical Bones by Bella Ellis. I really enjoyed this charming murder mystery where the Bronte sisters solve local crimes. Emily is often accompanied by her huge Bull Mastiff – Keeper. I loved Keeper, he’s so full of energy and sticks to Emily faithfully. He’s a keeper.
Toto from L Frank Baum’s Wizard of Oz – the list simply wouldn’t be complete without Toto, he has to be one of the most famous fictional dogs.
Oberon – an Irish Wolf Hound from Kevin Hearne’s Iron Druid Chronicles. This is a really great, fun series that I need to catch up with and Oberon is just brilliant, even more so because he can communicate with Atticus which makes for some very fun dialogue between the two – usually relating to sausages.
Jess and Jip – the two terriers from the excellent A Boy and His Dog At the End of the World. I highly recommend this book – it’s just excellent.
My next is a little out of left field. Sam Merlotte from Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse. Sam is a shape shifter but he prefers to take the shape of a mild mannered Collie – which is obviously Sam.
The Dogs of War by Adrian Tchaikovsky. Rex is a bioengineered bioform – in fact to give you the full idea here’s the description from GRs:
‘Rex is a genetically engineered Bioform, a deadly weapon in a dirty war. He has the intelligence to carry out his orders and feedback implants to reward him when he does. All he wants to be is a Good Dog. And to do that he must do exactly what Master says and Master says he’s got to kill a lot of enemies.’:
White Fang is part wolf part dog and plays the titular role in Jack London’s story of a wild dog and it’s transition to a domestic animal.
My final entry is three dogs from the Harry Potter series. Padfoot is Sirius Black’s shifted form. Fluffy, is the ill-named three headed dog that can be lulled to sleep by music and finally Fang is Hagrid’s huge dopey bloodhound
The final slot I’ll leave blank for you to tell me your own favourite fictional dog.