The Dog Who Came to Stay: A Memoir

Hal Borland

Nov 2011 · Open Road Media

About this ebook

The national bestselling memoir of a friendship between a New England outdoorsman and the scrawny foxhound who came to his door one snowy day.

In the midst of a blizzard, late one Christmas night in the 1950s, author Hal Borland heard a howl at the back door of his home on a hundred-acre farm in the Housatonic Valley of northwest Connecticut. Resistant at first, he called around trying to find an owner whose dog had gone missing—with no luck. Finally, with the encouragement of his wife and haunted by memories of his childhood collie, Borland brought some scraps of leftover steak outside. This was his introduction to Pat, a miserable, half-starved, but deeply trusting black-and-white foxhound mutt.
 
Pat would soon become a member of the family, accompanying Borland on hunts and terrorizing the local woodchuck population—and teaching him that sometimes our most immediate connection to the natural world is through the animals we live with. A longtime journalist and a winner of the John Burroughs Medal for distinguished nature writing, Borland tells the tale of the time he shared with Pat in this touching true story that “will appeal to many sportsmen and to all people who have ever been closely attached to a dog” (The New York Times Book Review).

Ratings and reviews

Great book for an afternoon read. I find myself smiling through most of it. At the end, you just sigh & smile.

the dog was lonesome and felt all alone he didn't think he had a friend in this whole world and then suddenlyhe had a friend and the man need a friend so they are both happy

Very readable, made me want to get a pet again, even though I'm very allergic.

About the author

DIVHal Borland (1900–1978) was a nature writer and novelist who produced numerous bestselling books including memoirs and young adult classics, as well as decades of nature writing for the New York Times. Borland considered himself a “natural philosopher,” and he was interested in exploring the way human life was bound to the greater world of plants, animals, and natural processes. 
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