A Pack of Your Own

Maria Nilsson Thore, illustrated by Maria Nilsson Thore

Picked for Children’s Book of the Week by The Times in 2022

A lonely dachshund dreams of a friend. But how can such a little dog make friends? Every time the dachshund goes to the exercise yard in the park where the other dogs hang out, it feels odd somehow.

The dachshund doesn’t fit in and even finds it hard to be around the other dogs. But all the others look as if they are having fun together.

With warm and clever humour, Maria Nilsson Thore has created a wonderful allegory about friendship in a dog’s world. With exquisitely sweet illustrations, readers are invited to dive into their imagination and to ask themselves questions about friendship, such as: how much should one adapt in order to be accepted and valued by others? And do we really need to be similar in order to be friends? Can a dachshund and a poodle be friends despite their differences?

‘The words are lively; the story is only just the right side of mawkish, but it’s the author’s stylish, funny illustrations that make the book a thing of beauty. The art is in the tradition of the English twins Janet and Anne Grahame Johnstone, the prolific illustrators of the 1950s whose work adorned the first editions of Dodie Smith’s One Hundred and One Dalmatians. It’s marrowbone for lovers of pre-digital, old-fashioned children’s books, and an excellent Christmas gift for doggy folk, old and young, with lavatory shelved that need adorning.’

– The Times