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sunshineariel's review against another edition
3.0
This was a decent romp through a young woman's struggles with boyfriends and public speaking. I liked that it came full circle, and I liked that the pugs on pug hill pulled it all together. Interesting chapter titles, decent character development, some humor, and a satisfactory ending.
bennse2's review against another edition
2.0
This book wasn't awesome, but it wasn't terrible. And if you really love dogs, are scared of public speaking, and/or have a thing for Rothkos, you might think it was amazing. I like Rothkos and think pugs are adorable, but not enough to balance out this book. The writing was fine but not remarkable, and the characters reminded me of real humans, but in a superficial way. Your time is probably better spent elsewhere.
kate_elizabeth's review against another edition
3.0
This book takes place in New York and was published in 2006, when I was living there. I wish I had read it then; it so perfectly captures what it's like to be young and single and confused and living in the city. Throw in an obsession with pugs (I had this) and a secret hope of finding "the one" (I had this, though most of my time in the city was brokenhearted and bewildered) and a tendency to see things as signs (I sometimes still have this) and it was basically like reading a book about my 24-year-old self. Only with a really bad copy editor who (more than once) couldn't figure out the difference between "your" and "you're." Still, I'm holding onto this one.
krst83's review against another edition
4.0
I was thinking 3 stars for this book until I got to the end. I think you really have to be able to relate to Hope to appreciate this book as it is kind of different. It will certainly make you want to go and hug your dog(s).
themundivagantbookery's review against another edition
3.0
It was a good read as a light book one can carry and not place when stopping and starting. I wish there was a little more development in the person of Hope and especially at the end. How did she change? Did any of this effect her love for the Zoloft egg?
pussreboots's review against another edition
2.0
My across-the-street neighbors had a bunch of pugs when I was a kid. They were the sweetest, nicest dogs. Because of them, I have a soft spot for pugs. I had to therefore give Pug Hill by Alison Pace a read.
By all accounts, I should have enjoyed Pug Hill. It takes place in New York City, it has pugs, heroine Hope McNeil works as an art restorer and yet none of these individually entertaining elements is enough to carry the story.
Hope McNeil's parents are coming up on their 40th wedding anniversary. They want Hope to give a speech but she's terrified of public speaking (of course) and spends the remainder of the book dreading the speech and coming to terms with her commitment to give it. Along the way she has boyfriend trouble and tries to seek meaning to life by watching the pugs of Pug Hill in Central Park.
That's it. That's all there is to this 312 page novel. The best chapter of the entire book is the chapter after she gives the speech. With her new found self confidence she takes charge and strikes up a romance with an old friend. This is where the book should have started from!
By all accounts, I should have enjoyed Pug Hill. It takes place in New York City, it has pugs, heroine Hope McNeil works as an art restorer and yet none of these individually entertaining elements is enough to carry the story.
Hope McNeil's parents are coming up on their 40th wedding anniversary. They want Hope to give a speech but she's terrified of public speaking (of course) and spends the remainder of the book dreading the speech and coming to terms with her commitment to give it. Along the way she has boyfriend trouble and tries to seek meaning to life by watching the pugs of Pug Hill in Central Park.
That's it. That's all there is to this 312 page novel. The best chapter of the entire book is the chapter after she gives the speech. With her new found self confidence she takes charge and strikes up a romance with an old friend. This is where the book should have started from!
leahmichelle_13's review
4.0
A couple of years ago I read my first Alison Pace novel, City Dog. I really enjoyed it – it’s so rare to read a novel that’s almost exclusively about dogs. However that is Pace’s forte – if you’re looking for anyone who writes about dogs so well then Pace is your girl. And I’m saying that having only read two of her novels. So, high praise indeed. Pug Hill is one of Alison’s earlier novels but since it’s a) coming out in November in mass-market paperback and b) it had a sequel released earlier this year that’s sitting on my shelf waiting to be read, I figured it was time I read Pug Hill. And it was puggalicious (I am so copyrighting that word…).
If the title hasn’t already clued you in, and you haven’t seen the book cover filled with pugs, then I’d like to let you know that Pug Hill is all about pugs. (I know, I am nothing if not obvious.) I mean, don’t get me wrong it’s about other things, too – Hope overcoming her fear of public speaking; Hope overcoming her crush on her girlfriended-up co-worker Elliott (no, I’m not entirely sure girlfriended-up is a word either, but it works, so it stays); Hope being Hope and overthinking everything; Hope overthinking her relationship with Evan (yup, despite crushing on Elliott, Hope has a boyfriend, named Evan). But, mostly, the novel is about the pugs and about Pug Hill. About how Pug Hill is Hope’s salvation; it’s where she goes when she needs to put the world to rights, when she needs to know there’s something that is solid in her life.
I will admit that I found the whole Hope overcoming her public speaking phobia to be both over the top (in a good way) and not as over the top as it should have been. I mean, the build up as Hope tries to overcome her public speaking is the over the top part, but the actual Hope trying to overcome her public speaking at her parents’ anniversary is rather brushed over somewhat. It sort of let the book down a bit for me. I mean, we’ve spent lessons with Hope as she tries to be able to speak freely in public without freaking out. We’ve spent hours at Pug Hill with her as she tries to overcome it. We’ve listened to why she can’t speak publicly, we’ve understood… So the end result should have had more time spent on it. It should have been bigger than it was. But sadly it wasn’t. It was all over much too quickly for my liking.
Pug Hill is very much about Hope; there are few secondary characters and the ones we meet are meetings that are rather brief (thankfully in Pamela’s case that’s a good thing, we barely even saw Pamela, Hope’s best friend, but I didn’t like her one bit). That can be good and bad; Hope was an excellent character, someone I liked immediately, someone I felt I clicked with (if that doesn’t make me some kind of weirdo), but it was disappointing to not get to meet more of Hope’s friends, more of Hope’s family. We heard of the things going on in Hope’s family (including some amusing conversations regarding a tent – oh, whoops, I hope Hope’s father doesn’t read my review; he doesn’t like tents…) which helped massively but it was a somewhat quiet novel without any other characters to get a grip of, however Hope makes up for it nicely.
Pug Hill was hugely enjoyable. I liked the pugs, I liked Hope, I liked the story, I just felt the conclusion was a bit of a let down. I got to the end of the book and, well, it didn’t feel finished. I thought maybe I was missing some pages (metaphorically speaking since I was reading it on my Kindle). But everything leading up to it was brilliant. Alison Pace knows her dogs, and I was in tears at the words she wrote about Captain, Hope’s parents’ ageing dog even though he was perfectly fine. (Honestly, I’m not lying; there was nothing wrong with him; it’s just… the way Pace writes and the way I imaginged Captain being so happy, it made me well up.) This is a tale for all dog lovers. No offense to those who don’t like dogs, but they generally sneer at books filled with dogs and unless you love dogs you won’t love Pug Hill. I loved dogs and I loved Pug Hill. I can’t wait to read A Pug’s Tale and be back with Hope and the pugs.
If the title hasn’t already clued you in, and you haven’t seen the book cover filled with pugs, then I’d like to let you know that Pug Hill is all about pugs. (I know, I am nothing if not obvious.) I mean, don’t get me wrong it’s about other things, too – Hope overcoming her fear of public speaking; Hope overcoming her crush on her girlfriended-up co-worker Elliott (no, I’m not entirely sure girlfriended-up is a word either, but it works, so it stays); Hope being Hope and overthinking everything; Hope overthinking her relationship with Evan (yup, despite crushing on Elliott, Hope has a boyfriend, named Evan). But, mostly, the novel is about the pugs and about Pug Hill. About how Pug Hill is Hope’s salvation; it’s where she goes when she needs to put the world to rights, when she needs to know there’s something that is solid in her life.
I will admit that I found the whole Hope overcoming her public speaking phobia to be both over the top (in a good way) and not as over the top as it should have been. I mean, the build up as Hope tries to overcome her public speaking is the over the top part, but the actual Hope trying to overcome her public speaking at her parents’ anniversary is rather brushed over somewhat. It sort of let the book down a bit for me. I mean, we’ve spent lessons with Hope as she tries to be able to speak freely in public without freaking out. We’ve spent hours at Pug Hill with her as she tries to overcome it. We’ve listened to why she can’t speak publicly, we’ve understood… So the end result should have had more time spent on it. It should have been bigger than it was. But sadly it wasn’t. It was all over much too quickly for my liking.
Pug Hill is very much about Hope; there are few secondary characters and the ones we meet are meetings that are rather brief (thankfully in Pamela’s case that’s a good thing, we barely even saw Pamela, Hope’s best friend, but I didn’t like her one bit). That can be good and bad; Hope was an excellent character, someone I liked immediately, someone I felt I clicked with (if that doesn’t make me some kind of weirdo), but it was disappointing to not get to meet more of Hope’s friends, more of Hope’s family. We heard of the things going on in Hope’s family (including some amusing conversations regarding a tent – oh, whoops, I hope Hope’s father doesn’t read my review; he doesn’t like tents…) which helped massively but it was a somewhat quiet novel without any other characters to get a grip of, however Hope makes up for it nicely.
Pug Hill was hugely enjoyable. I liked the pugs, I liked Hope, I liked the story, I just felt the conclusion was a bit of a let down. I got to the end of the book and, well, it didn’t feel finished. I thought maybe I was missing some pages (metaphorically speaking since I was reading it on my Kindle). But everything leading up to it was brilliant. Alison Pace knows her dogs, and I was in tears at the words she wrote about Captain, Hope’s parents’ ageing dog even though he was perfectly fine. (Honestly, I’m not lying; there was nothing wrong with him; it’s just… the way Pace writes and the way I imaginged Captain being so happy, it made me well up.) This is a tale for all dog lovers. No offense to those who don’t like dogs, but they generally sneer at books filled with dogs and unless you love dogs you won’t love Pug Hill. I loved dogs and I loved Pug Hill. I can’t wait to read A Pug’s Tale and be back with Hope and the pugs.
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