In my talks about animal emotions, I always ask the audience to tell me their favorite books about animals. Sometimes they are the usual classics, like Black Beauty or Watership Down, and sometimes they are the more modern classics by Jane Goodall and Elizabeth Marshall Thomas, but I was interested to learn that many people in my talks mentioned The Compassion of Anireals, by Kristin yon Kreisler. It is one of my favorite books, too,which is why I wrote a foreword to it. When I ask them why they liked the book so much, they often tell me that it is because it speaks to them in a language they can understand. They do not have to worry that they will be put off by words they do not know, concepts that are strange to them, research that is beyond their comprehension. It feels,"one woman said to me, like sitting down with a kindly neighbor and having a really deep conversation about animals.

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A 209-pounct potbellied pig throws herself intotraffic to help save her guardian, who is suffering a heart attack. A doff takes a loaf of bread from the family pantry and brlnhs it to a girl confined to her bed. A horse stands guard over an injured baby rabbit and refuses to leave until the creature is rescued.

These are just a few of the hundreds of true accounts collected in BEAUTY IN THE BEASTS : a captivating narrative that combines provocative scientific findings with a compassionate understanding of the natural world to show that animals, like humans, can and do choose to do good.

Writes Philip Gonzales, author of THE DOG WHO RESCUES CATS,Finally yon Kreisler is pointing out what's so easy to see, but hardly anyone does : Animals choose to act with incredible honesty, decency, and purpose. Anyone who loves anJmals will want to read this wonderful book.

Foreword by

Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson

Acknowledgments

Introduction

1. SENSITIVITY

2. COMPASSION

3. COURACE

4. LOYALTY

5. FORTITUDE

6. COOPERATION

7. RESOURCEFULNESS

8. GENEROSITY

Selected Bibliograpby