Five-Dog Epiphany

IN FIVE-DOG EPIPHANY, MARIANNE LEONE writes about the joy that can be summoned after a great loss, "when you look into the eyes of another damaged creature and know that your happiness is a mirror and an echo and a prayer, and that the little soul reflecting all that energy is happy too, at last." This memoir is a moving and sometimes surprisingly funny exploration of grief and the mutual healing that can occur between rescue dogs and people who have experienced a soul-crushing loss. Leone and her husband, actor Chris Cooper, lost their only child suddenly in 2005. Jesse was seventeen, a straight-A student, and a brilliant poet, who was also quadriplegic and nonverbal except with the assistance of a computer.