The good good pig - Sy Montgomery

"In loving yet unsentimental prose, Sy Montgomery captures the richness that animals bring to the human experience. Sometimes it takes a too-smart-for-his-own-good pig to open our eyes to what most matters in life."
-John Grogan, author ofMarley & Me: Life and Love with the World's Worst Dog

A naturalist
who spent months at a time living on her own among wild creatures in remote jungles,
Sy Montgomery had always felt more comfortable with animals than with people. So
she gladly opened her heart to a sick piglet who had been crowded away from nourishing
meals by his stronger siblings. Yet Sy had no inkling that this piglet, later named
Christopher Hogwood, would not only survive but flourish-and she soon found herself
engaged with her small-town community in ways she had never dreamed possible. Unexpectedly,
Christopher provided this peripatetic traveler with something she had sought all
her life: an anchor (eventually weighing 750 pounds) to family and home.

The Good
Good Pig celebrates Christopher Hogwood in all his glory, from his inauspicious infancy
to hog heaven in rural New Hampshire, where his boundless zest for life and his large,
loving heart made him absolute monarch over a (mostly) peaceable kingdom. At first,
his domain included only Sy's cosseted hens and her beautiful border collie, Tess.
Then the neighbors began fetching Christopher home from his unauthorized jaunts,
the little girls next door started giving him warm, soapy baths, and the villagers
brought him delicious leftovers. His intelligence and fame increased along with his
girth. He was featured in USA Today and on several National Public Radio environmental
programs. On election day, some voters even wrote in Christopher's name on their
ballots.

But as this enchanting book describes, Christopher Hogwood's influence
extended far beyond celebrity; for he was, as a friend said, a great big Buddha master.
Sy reveals what she and others learned from this generous soul who just so happened
to be a pig-lessons about self-acceptance, the meaning of family, the value of community,
and the pleasures of the sweet green Earth. The Good Good Pig provides proof that
with love, almost anything is possible.