Sunderland, John. The Last Shepherd’s Dog and Other Stories From a Rural Spanish Village High and Hidden in the Costa Blanca Mountains. Shilka Publishing, 2025.
Reason read: for LibraryThing’s Early Review Program.
There is this phenomenon where AI can take every essay, short story, blog, personal letter, Christmas card, and term paper and turn it into a mishmash of a novel. I am not saying this is what happened with The Last Shepherd’s Dog and Other Stories From a Rural Spanish Village High and Hidden in the Costa Blanca Mountains, but I bet if you look hard enough you will find a blog or newspaper column with much of the same content. I sense it by the number of times Sunderland explains why he moved with his wife from New York City to Spain and from the rambling commentary. I sense it in the brevity and random subject matter of each of the chapters. They are entertaining stories in and of themselves, but they don’t convey life in Spain specifically. Sunderland writes about painting a portrait of a man so lifelike the deceased’s loved ones are moved to strong emotion. He writes another story about a perpetually closed grocery store that has him baffled. All in all it was a fun read.
Author fact: John Sunderland has been a writer, graphic designer, filmmaker, animator, and a museum designer. No wonder he was looking to retire somewhere far away and remote as possible.
Music: “New York, New York.”
~*LunaSea*~ 