Best Friends: The True Story of the World's Most Beloved Animal Sanctuary
By: Samantha Glen / Narrated By: Juliette Parker
Length: 9 hrs and 17 mins
I have only the greatest respect for those who love animals and work at kill-shelters, but I gotta admit: There’s just something wonderful about the greatest no-kill group around!
EsPECially as Best Friends was the group I wound up hooking up with when I went to New Orleans in the February after Hurricane Katrina hit. Soooo many animal rescue groups had left by that time (The Humane Society of the United States took in $10 million in donations but booked it waaaaay earlier!), but Best Friends stayed until the state of Louisiana kicked out-of-town rescue groups out, the end of February.
Can a person be blessed during such a time of post-devastation suffering and chaos? I certainly was!
Aside from one inCREDibly insensitive person, the folks at Best Friends treated all of us volunteers so well; we were soooo welcomed! And they took great care of us; plus, they worked throughout the entire Gulf region, working in Louisiana, had Tylertown in Mississippi—you name it: Where FEMA was not? Best Friends was there! Okay, okay, okay! So FEMA was sooome places. But still. It was rescue groups who helped animals and people alike.
And so I was delighted to give this, the story of Best Friends, a shot.
I’d read it in print before, so it was nice to revisit it as an audiobook now.
The story opens with homeless and feral cat brothers, one of them blind, in dire need of assistance. To the point where the Good Samaritan who’s been caring for them is in a quandary because she doesn’t know what to do for them. Enter Best Friends.
The place, in Kanab, Utah, is completely, wholly, enTIREly! no-kill! And every single animal that finds a home there will either be adopted out to a good and loving forever home. Or need never worry about safety, love, care, again. This is the story of the group of almost-hippies and their coming together to move their rescue ranch to someplace bigger, someplace that could better encompass their dream of providing care and comfort to more and more and MORE animals. They came from all walks of life, and they soon were able to get even veterinarians in the circle.
The book goes on to tell the stories of many animals. And tho’ there is HORRIFIC cruelty in some of the animals’s pasts (Heck! In most of ‘em…), this is NOT a book that’ll have you cringing. And where a lot of people would see the effects of such cruelty, say in Sinjin the grievously burned cat’s case, and would seek euthanasia, the people of Best Friends put their money into healing. I can’t say that I’d TOTALLY agree with that as euthanasia ends suffering, but it IS nice to hear wonderful stories of those animals healing and going on to have lives filled with love. There are so very many stories with just that: The Happy Ending.
Juliette Parker does a decent enough job with the narration. But I must say that she’s not a veritable standout. She kinda has the sort of voice, the sort of delivery, that neither adds nor detracts from the story. Smooth tones, good inflection and decent emotion, but her voice is rather, well, I’m not going to remember it for much longer after I’ve finished.
You want to hear a lot of Happily Ever Afters? I usually look for them in other types of books. But here, after the cruelty, after the barbarism? Here! YES! There are fantastic stories of love and laughter.
By the way? I went to the Sanctuary after Best Friends airlifted 300 animals from Lebanon when that country was visited by war and unrest. I spent a week volunteering, and I can say, without a doubt that they so totally rock. Yes, kill-shelters have animals that deserve and need sooo much—but I don’t think my heart could ever volunteer with them. Best Friends?
I’m THERE!!!
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