Touched By All Creatures: Doctoring Animals in the Pennsylvania Dutch Country Book

This is the story of Gay Balliet and Edgar, her veterinarian husband, who tend the health of strange and delightful barn animals, buffaloes, baboons and other creatures large and small in the historically rich and colorful Pennsylvania Dutch Country. They share many unforgettable situations, characters, and experiences of courage, warmth, and hilarity with both their animal and human friends. Among them: Tonto, an impish llama and his sheep friends; Buster, a lame bull who leads chase through woods and pond; and Lowell, the existential pig who performs pirouettes to the command "Baryshnikov." Theirs is a timeless world that retains innocence and an appreciation of nature — a world they now share with animal lovers everywhere.

Publishers Weekly

"We are a hearty, plump, affable group that appreciates fatty foods and good friends," begins Balliet, describing herself and her veterinarian husband, along with the Pennsylvania Dutch community they serve as a "mobile veterinary MASH team." Balliet, an English professor at a local college, sets out her theme with earnest straightforwardness, announcing that she intends to show readers the unknown in the midst of the everyday, to deliver a sense of "otherworldliness, along with a sense of deep personal commitment and selflessness." But Balliet places an undue amount of importance on her and her husband's life preceding and surrounding Edgar's beginning his practice as a veterinarian. Throughout, the writing is stilted and wincingly quaint ("We had so little money that the most economic abode was a mobile home"). Chapters include "A Day to Remember," "Excitement at the Allentown Fair" and "A Dog in Cat's Clothing." Ultimately, Balliet's book fails to transcend the level of sentimental reminiscence. Still, animal lovers, especially those with ties to rural Pennsylvania, may be willing to overlook the text's belabored preciousness in order to savor stories of lovable cats, horses, llamas, goats and birds, as well as of a host of eccentric local characters (including one who believes that any ailment can be cured with urine). Despite the excess literary fat and sugar, the wonder of animals and the earthy humane details of doctoring them shines through. (Apr.)