This bucolic children’s book contains a collection of humorous stories following the adventures and misadventures at The Lazy Dog Hacienda kennels in Oklahoma.

Hickory Doc’s Tales is a cute story about a family of hunting dogs. Zeke is easily my favorite character because he is the misunderstood uncle and sort of the black sheep of the family. Zeke considers himself better than his brother and family. Eventually he becomes humble and children will learn a good lesson along the way as well. Newt is my second favorite character because he is loyal and even though he is a different breed of dog, they still consider him family, this sends a wonderful message of diversity and inclusion to young readers. He is a little insecure, but quickly realizes his differences are positive and helpful. It’s cute to see how close this family of dogs are, the lengths they go through for one another and the adventures they share. There is also a delightful variety of colorful side characters that appear throughout the book.

Now, even though the characters were lovely I wasn’t fond of the author’s writing style. I felt like that held back the story a bit. It was well edited, but some of the wording felt almost robotic.

This is a book for young readers that are transitioning to chapter books. The book was well edited, but I wanted there to be more of a flow to the language so that the writing matched the easy flow of life in the book.

I loved the illustrations! They were very well done and added life and dimension to the story. The illustrations were placed perfectly throughout the book giving you a better feel for what happened in that chapter. The chapters are very short. The book itself is perfect for an elementary student from grades four to six. I found it interesting that the author is a hunting dog owner and wondered about all the sources of inspiration she must have had!

Hickory Doc’S Tales is such a cute story that young readers will absolutely adore.

Pages: 116 | ASIN: B0796623SZ