Read reviews of Come, Let Me Guide You
"Come, Let Me Guide You conveys in vivid detail what life is like with a guide dog. It is a luminous record of friendship, mutual caring, communication, and exquisite sensitivity between a human being and an animal. This is a beautiful book that deserves a broad readership." —Shelley Fisher Fishkin, editor of Mark Twain's Book of Animals
"Feminist ethnographer Susan Krieger continues to reveal the gifts of blindness in her story of interspecies communion with her guide dog, Teela. At her wedding, the dinner table, the classroom, Teela expands Krieger's family in fresh ways. Their profound rapport goes beyond pet or prosthesis to an interdependent working companion relation of mutual recognition and reliance." —Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, author of Extraordinary Bodies: Figuring Physical Disability in American Culture and Literature
"Susan Krieger continues to amaze me with her ability to take on the 'brave space' of facing life's challenges as a blind woman, scholar, teacher, daughter, partner, and—most importantly—co-traveler with her guide dog Teela. As in Krieger's previous books, she makes connections from specific aspects of her life to broader societal topics. This book is beautifully written, persuasive, and well organized. It makes important scholarly contributions to human-animal bond studies and to the intersection of gender, sexuality, and disability." —Esther Rothblum, Department of Women's Studies, San Diego State University
"Susan Krieger's account of her ten years with Teela, her guide dog, is a moving look at the blossoming of a human-canine relationship, and much more as well. Krieger is a sociologist and a feminist studies professor at Stanford who began gradually losing her vision two decades ago. Her intimate relationship with Teela and her descriptions of how the two of them began to radically change each others' lives will seem familiar to anyone who has a deep bond with an other-than-human companion. It is also an emotional look at life's changes. Krieger discusses her battle with vision loss and Teela's role in helping her cope. In addition, the book details how, after Teela began getting close to retirement, the pair's relationship would change again as a new guide dog moves in—a subject rarely discussed in more conventional narratives. Come, Let Me Guide You is a lovely and important book for anyone interested in the precarious nature of identity and in shifting relationships—human/human and human/non-human." —Margo DeMello, author of Animals and Society: An Introduction to Human-Animal Studies
"I was in tears when I was reading in the last chapter about the graduation. It's very, very, very moving. …The handoff at the end when you talk about the relationship between Teela and Fresco was really fascinating and moving as well. …I so much enjoyed reading it." —Larry Meiller, Wisconsin Public Radio
"Come, Let Me Guide You plays with themes of grief and letting go, but also touches on embracing change. And while these themes are applied to a blind person, they are universal feelings that a general reader can appreciate. …The book directly places the reader in the center of the bond between a blind person and their guide dog. … One can't help but draw closer to the pair." —Belo Cipriani, Bay Area Reporter
"There's nothing like a human's best friend, especially when you need a gentle guide to help you through life, as Stanford scholar Susan Krieger observes. …Krieger found that having a guide dog offers several benefits: assistance in mobility to compensate for lost sight, companionship to counter the aloneness that blindness brings, interconnectedness with others of a positive nature and a sense of playfulness with the dog." —Clifton Parker, Stanford News, Great Reads