Turn the Page Tuesday - The Good Good Pig

'Christopher Hogwood came home on my lap in a shoebox.
On a rain-drenched April evening, so cold the frogs were silent, so gray we could hardly see our barn, my husband drove our rusting Subaru over mud roads sodden with melted snow. Pig manure caked on our boots. The smell of a sick animal hung heavy in our clothes.'
-Sy Montgomery, The Good Good Pig

It's time once again for Turn the Page Tuesday, hosted by Adrienne at Some of a Kind. Pop over to participate and/or see what everyone else is reading.

My choice this month is The Good Good Pig by Sy Montgomery. Sy is a naturalist who has spent months in the jungles, alone with only wild creatures for company. In this book, she talks about the fact that she always has felt more comfortable with animals than with people, so her life work came very naturally for her.
Sy and her husband meet Christopher Hogwood for the first time at a farm of some friends who raise pigs. Christopher is the runt of the litter and barely surviving, so Sy and Howard bring him home, hoping to give him a chance but barely expecting that he will actually live until morning. They are vegetarians, so if Chris makes it, he will live a long and full life as an eccentric pet in the Montgomery's barn.
Chris does make it, eventually becoming a very big pig, and this story is so full of the love and delight that not only Sy and Howard find in this dear pig, but how he charms the entire town, healing the hearts of many people he comes in contact with. George, the owner of the pig farm where Chris was born, puts it perfectly. "That pig has done well for himself."

The Good Good Pig is a wonderful book, I thoroughly enjoyed it even though I grew up on a farm and come from a huge hunting and fishing family. There is quite a lot of naturalist and vegetarian talk in this book, which is fine, because that's who the author is and it is her words, not mine. I raised pigs as my FFA project while I was in high school and can tell you that, like this book says, yes, they are very intelligent and full of personality. It was quite the fun read.

Thanks, Adrienne, for hosting Turn the Page Tuesday once again!