Hero Dogs: How a Pack of Rescues, Rejects, and Strays Became America’s Greatest Disaster-Search Partners

Melville, a canine search-and-rescue handler who was inspired to launch the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation (SDF) after volunteering to help look for Oklahoma City bombing survivors in 1995, shares the struggles of establishing and maintaining the organization. She details the rigorous work that goes into preparing the dogs and their handlers, emphasizing her good fortune in meeting with Pluis Davern, the SDF’s gifted trainer. Melville doesn’t pull any punches, sharing tales of needless infighting among competing search-and-rescue organizations (dog trainers tend to be type-A, since “they’re used to being obeyed”), as well as within her own group. The organization made great strides in terms of producing highly trained animals, but struggled to attract support until 9/11 showed the necessity of its work. Melville skillfully recounts how the dogs assisted with the nail-biting search for survivors in lower Manhattan’s vast wreckage. That experience, for both animals and handlers, became crucial when Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005, and then when an earthquake leveled Haiti in 2010. It makes for a harrowing, often heartbreaking, yet inspirational tale as Melville eloquently explores the small victories and wrenching losses of the dogs’ much-needed work. Agent: Elizabeth Winick Rubinstein, McIntosh & Otis. (Jan.)