Intelligent, sensitive, affectionate, joyful. Some of the adjectives to define a dog, the animal that has been man’s companion and helper since time immemorial. There are many other adjectives because dogs have multi-form personalities and, perhaps, still haven’t been completely understood. That is why the ethologist Danilo Mainardi decided to write an entire book about them, combining his reflections to stories about his life with dogs, or rather, the dogs of his life. In fact, this book is not the classic guide of the good instructor because, a born observer, Mainardi has always had rather unorthodox behaviour with his animals. That is to say, discovering spontaneous behaviours has always prevailed over the idea of training. Certainly, to understand these behaviours it is essential to go over, together with him, the natural and cultural history of the species beginning with its progenitor, the wolf, the first taken into the human family and the progenitor in the distant past of today’s more than four hundred “official” canine breeds. Not to mention the so-called crossbreeds (the politically correct definition of mutts or mongrels), representatives of a fascinating universe where one can discover stories that if they weren’t true would really seem incredible. Then the amusing and surprising discovery of the ethologically refined interaction that the dog knows how to concoct with its dearest enemy, the cat. At the end of the book is an appendix by Luisa Mainardi for concrete application of subjects like the integration and correct education of the dog in the human family, and in it you will find the practical distillation of many fascinating “canine narratives”. When you close this book, you’ll look at your dog with different eyes – without prejudice, clichés and various indoctrinations. And you’ll discover another dog. The real one.