New York Times bestselling author Jon Katz-“a Thoreau for contemporary times” (San Antonio Express-News)-offers us a deeper knowledge of the inner lives of animals and teaches us how exactly we can better talk to them, made real by his personal remarkable experiences with a wide array of creatures great and little.

In Talking to Pets, journalist Jon Katz-who still left his Manhattan lifestyle behind 2 decades ago forever on a farm where he’s surrounded by dogs, pet cats, sheep, horses, cows, goats, about Talking to Animals: WAYS TO Understand Animals plus they Can Understand You and chickens-marshals his experience to offer us a deeper insight into animals and the various tools necessary for effectively communicating with them.

Devoting each chapter to a specific animal from his life, Katz tells funny and illuminating stories about his profound experiences with them, displaying us how healthy engagement with pets falls into five major areas: Food, Movement, Visualization, Vocabulary, and Instincts. Along the way, we match Simon the donkey who finds Katz’s plantation near death and today serves as his Tai Chi partner. We meet Red the dog who started out antisocial and untrained and is now a therapy dog working with veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan. And we satisfy Winston, the dignified and courageous rooster who was harmed defending his hens from a hawk and who has better interpersonal skills than most humans.

Thoughtful and smart, lively and powerful, this book will completely change how you think about and connect to animals. Katz’s “honest, straightforward, and sometimes searing prose will speak to those who like animals, and may well convert some who usually do not” (Booklist).