Stealing Love: Confessions of a Dognapper

The title of this memoir is misleading: it's less about dogs than about Fischer's unhappy childhood, full of losses that she says developed in her a sense of justice that led her to become a crime reporter and, more recently, a savior of suffering dogs, stealing them from abusive owners. Fischer was only four when her father committed her mother—suffering from depression—to a state-run mental institution; soon after, not knowing how to care for Fischer and her sister, Kate, he sent them off to a convent school. In vivid prose, the author describes visits she and Kate made to their nearly unrecognizable mother. She emerged from her hospitalization in 1965, after nine years, and, though her husband had divorced her, she was eventually happily reunited with her daughters. During the 1960s, Fischer experimented with drugs and sex, and was arrested for shoplifting but finally found her path with a journalism career, making her mark by reporting on the McMartin preschool molestation case. Toward the end of this chronicle, the author discusses her recent avocation as a dognapper, sparked by taking care of Charlie, her sister's neglected dog. Though dotted with moving moments, this story of a highly dysfunctional family is disorganized and overlong with regret. (Sept.)