There are books you read and books that stay with you. Live Like Abbey by Luciana Hill is unmistakably the latter. Part memoir, part love letter to dogs, part self-help book, this book will alternate between making you go aww and giving you some profound lessons of wisdom. As a dog owner myself, after I read this book I couldn’t help but look at my lab in a new light, and I suspect I’m not alone in that.
The book tells the superficially ordinary story of the author’s family adopting a dog called Abbey, a Rottweiler. After discussing her own struggles with sickness (Lyme Disease), the author tells of how she came to adopt the sickly pup. At the beginning, Abbey is a runt Rottweiler puppy so small and fragile she couldn’t compete with her littermates for food or warmth. Born without a hip socket, Abbey was, by every clinical measure, unlikely to thrive.
What follows is the story of two broken beings finding, in each other, reasons to keep going. The author thought she was rescuing Abbey. She comes to understand, slowly and movingly, that Abbey was rescuing her right back. It’s a story that everyone who has ever loved a dog will find something in common with.
This is not simply a cute dog book, though it does have plenty of cute pictures and moments. It is, in fact, largely a book about disability, resilience and refusing to let your problems define you. Abbey’s missing hip socket becomes a lens through which the author examines her own chronic illness, and Hill draws lessons from Abbey throughout the book.
When the veterinarian insists that amputation is the only humane option, the family makes the difficult decision to decline. In doing so, they give Abbey a chance to demonstrate what she is capable of on her own terms, even though there will be challenges and pain. It is a decision the author reveals she never regretted for a single day.
Abbey, in turn, teaches through action rather than words. Despite walking being more difficult for her than other dogs, she stumbles, falls but always tries again. She discovers swimming, where gravity no longer limits her. She runs full-speed patrols along the fence line, transforming what looks like disability into just her way of navigating the world. The author begins to see the parallel with her own life: just as Abbey has pain but is not a painful dog, she can have Lyme disease without becoming only a sick person. It sounds simple, but it’s an important message.
The book is thoughtfully structured, each chapter revealing a lesson Abbey taught the author. For example, she teaches something about presence and compassion. Abbey had an uncanny ability to read the people around her, arriving at someone’s side before they had fully registered their own distress, offering not solutions but company. On the author’s worst days, Abbey would abandon her comfortable dog bed to lie on the hard floor beside her, simply because that was where she was needed. Hill credits this quality with changing how she herself listens and notice, how she learned to offer comfort rather than fixes, and to stay rather than solve. It is one of the numerous important lessons in the book.
The book is also unexpectedly funny in places, which is part of what makes it work. Abbey steals Christmas ornaments and buries them around the house for months. She ambushes her husband’s boots every evening without fail. She hauls an 8-pound medicine ball up two flights of stairs and installs it on the bed with complete satisfaction. These moments of pure dog comedy sit alongside the harder passages without undermining them. If anything, they deepen the book’s central argument, that joy and difficulty are not opposites but companions, and that the capacity to find delight in ordinary things is itself a form of resilience worth cultivating.
Throughout the book, adaptation to one’s personal difficulties replaces resignation. Abbey does not deny her missing hip socket, rather she works with it, around it, and occasionally in spite of it. Watching her do so reshapes the way the author understands her own body and her own possibilities. Abbey’s disability is never seen as a tragedy. As someone with a mild disability (IBD), I really loved this message of the book.
The book is lovingly put together, including plenty of photographs of Abbey with the author’s family. Each chapter opens with a quote and the book closes with reflection questions, making it well-suited to a book club or therapeutic setting, particularly with young people or those with sickness. The editing is clean and the pacing well-judged. At 132 pages, this is not a book that overstays its welcome, and feels the perfect length.
What I really liked about this book is that it isn’t afraid to tackle the darker aspects of life, yet it never dwells on them and instead chooses to focus on the brighter side. Without giving anything away, the story has its fair share of tear-jerking moments, but they are always delivered with an underlying message of hope. My only warning would be that if you’ve recently lost a dog and it’s still raw, this book may stir up some difficult memories.
Ultimately, Live Like Abbey is an obvious recommendation for dog lovers, and particularly for anyone who has had or is considering a Rottweiler. The author does an excellent job dismantling the unfair reputation the breed carries. It’s also an ideal book for those struggling with disabilities or health issues. Anyone who enjoyed Marley and Me will feel at home here. But the book reaches well beyond the dog-lover audience. Anyone navigating chronic illness, grief, or really any personal struggles will find something here.
Final verdict: For fans of John Grogan, The Art of Racing in the Rain and A Dog’s Purpose, Live Like Abbey is both a cute book and one that has some powerful lessons within its page. I have no criticisms to offer. If possible, read it with a dog by your side.
You can get your copy of Live Like Abbey here or read it for free on Kindle Unlimited!
