Book Report: This Dog Will Change Your Life

I was looking forward to This Dog Will Change Your Life, by The Dogist, Elias Weiss Friedman (2025), because I was in the mood for something light-hearted and perhaps funny, to take my mind off current events. Plus, as you may be aware, I’m fond of dogs.

Well, the book does have dogs, many dogs, even. And they’re good dogs, yes they are. But, not being familiar with the media influencer known as The Dogist (Elias made that name up himself), I didn’t know what to expect. I’m going to be charitable and say that his little quotes from dog owners must be more interesting accompanied by their supposedly very cute photos. Unfortunately, there are no photos in the book, just quotes from his Instagram:

Mister, German Shepherd (6 years old), Washington Square Park, New York, NY •

“He’s new to the city from Portland, Oregon. He’s a softie-he craves attention in a very un-Germanic way.”

Ok. Great. This was one of the better ones.

The book rambles around while Elias tells us about places he went to take photos of dogs and how interesting he finds it. He’s very happy that people recognize him and that he gets to go fun places to look at dogs. The dog parts of the book are okay, but there’s an awful lot about Elias and his life, which is nice but not very interesting.

I couldn’t really figure out the structure or where the book was going. Each chapter is a story about a dog that makes someone happy. I didn’t find much humor in the writing, though. Bland but well meaning is the best way I can describe it. And all that required a co-writer, Ben Greenman, who has ghost written for others.

I think media influencers may not be very experienced in writing more than a few sentences and linking them together. That makes sense, because they aren’t required to do it to gain their fame. My guess is that The Dogist is a really good photographer who puts his notes by photos of cute dogs, very well. I hope he sticks with it in the future.

Sorry to give a negative review. But this book was just not for this dog lover.