View source for Beautiful Dogs Postcard Book: 30 Postcards of Champion Breeds to Keep or Send by Andrew Perris

{{infobox1
|title=Beautiful Dogs Postcard Book: 30 Postcards of Champion Breeds to Keep or Send
|author=Andrew Perris
|reviewer=Sue Magee
|genre=Pets
|summary=A lovely present for any dog-lover.  Beautifully produced and a good selection of some of the more unusual dog breeds.
|rating=4
|buy=Yes
|borrow=No
|pages=30
|publisher=Ivy Press
|date=September 2014
|isbn=978-1782401667
|cover=Perris_Dogs
|aznuk=1782401660
|aznus=1782401660
}}

If you're looking for a present for a dog lover, ''Beautiful Dogs'' might fit the bill.  It's a book of thirty postcards, which you can either send or keep in the book.  You might expect to find the more usual breeds - Labradors, Retrievers and the like - but instead you'll find more exotic breeds such as the Bedlington Terrier and the Bolognese.  There's just the one dog or bitch on each card and Andrew Perris has managed to give us an excellent view of the animal whilst allowing it to look completely natural.

The cards are perforated at the spine and stay firmly in the book or remove easily.  As well as using them as postcards I'd happily frame some of the pictures and I'm presently using one card as a bookmark.  The back shows the breed and whether the animal pictured is a dog or a bitch and there are a couple of lines at the bottom giving some details about the breed.  There's plenty of space for a message and the recipient's address.  But that's not the important part - you want to know about the fronts.

All the dogs are presented against a dark background, which is brilliantly successful with the American Cocker Spaniel bitch (she has a rather imperious look) but less so with the Hungarian Puli - Perris must have had to wait for her to put her tongue out to give the face some definition!  I was particularly struck by the Keeshond - usually known as the Dutch Barge Dog.  I encountered one in the village a few days ago and Perris has caught the lively playfulness perfectly.  My favourite has to be the Afghan - but I really wouldn't like to have to cope with the grooming required to maintain that gorgeous coat.

It would make a lovely present - but if you're a dog lover then you might want to get two copies as I have a suspicion that you might want to keep one for yourself.  I'd like to thank the publishers for sending a copy to the Bookbag.

For more gorgeous pictures of dogs we can recommend [[Old Dogs by Gene Weingarten and Michael S Williamson (Photographer)]].  To see more of the work of Andrew Perris, have a look at [[Beautiful Owls: Portraits of Arresting Species from Around the World by Marianne Taylor and Andrew Perris]].

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[[Category:Art]]