Pit Bulls for Dummies Book

This book would be a good choice if you can currently only buy one dog book. Between anecdotal pit bull knowledge and decent-owner-level dog care knowledge, it felt more like a review than any new information from where I'm at. If you have a good general dog care book you like, and understand the extra care that goes into being the guardian of such a controversial animal, it probably isn't new to you.

This opinion comes in part from a couple chapters that are meaningless to me because they are about breed showing standards, which I'm not interested in. I was not surprised by the writing to find out that the author has written several dog breed books rather than being invested in pit bulls herself. There is only a blurb about the potential of rescuing a dog. The author dismisses it as a more difficult, but possible, thing to do and moves on. If it is more difficult, I believe it deserves more pages, not less! It seemed almost as though the author was including it only for lack of controversy.

There is also a bunch of talk in the book on how pit bull fighting is a history that should be honored and they should continue to be bred to the standards that made them good fighting dogs, even if it can't be technically demonstrated. This all just felt really weird, almost uncomfortable to me....given the current state of pit-type dog welfare and reputation, hand-waving rescue options and encouraging breed standards and having papers as the only way to go feels irresponsible, not to mention ingenuine from someone who may not even have pit-specific experience.

As critical as all that sounds, a lot of the information in this book is accessible and accurate, so I don't think it'd be a bad choice for the right person'someone who really just needs a basic dog care reference with a few pit bits thrown in.