Boating with Buster

Is it a travel book, a book about beagles, a book about boating, an historical and factual feast - yes all of the above! Alison captures the atmosphere of every place they visit along their journey with the wonderfully entertaining Buster the beagle. She covers everything you need to know about boats, beagles, loss and the kindness of strangers. I was hooked from the introduction and read it in record time (I usually take 6+ months to read a book but this one took me just 2 months). It flows so well and it is so nice to read a book with accurate punctuation. Beware though, there are a couple of sections that really have the heart strings well and truly strangled. Having owned beagles for 20 odd years, I know their traits and characters so well but I am not sure I would ever be able to convey this in writing. Alison does and she does it so very well, you can't help but chuckle. I read so many sections out loud to my hubby and we both laughed in agreement. Alison writes with such personal, powerful emotion and I really hope she writes more. Well done Alison!

Alison and her husband Roger find that life takes on a new dimension as they travel through Europe on board Lily, their Dutch barge. Buster is adorable. Alison's writing is easy, interesting and gently humorous. A delight!

Boating with Buster is a simple title for what turns out to be an inspirational tale. In her debut book, Alison Alderton has cleverly interwoven, not just a travelogue, but a tender love story of courageous humans, a pretty little barge and one very special pet. This three-part journey navigates from the established waterways of the English canals, via the calm waters of rural Ireland, to the journey of a lifetime through Europe. Alison weaves her heart-warming memories of Buster the Beagle into an insightful picture of life on the water and all the colourful episodes that come with it. Throughout, this is illustrated beautifully by Alison’s own accomplished photography. Fans of boats, dogs or epic journeys will naturally love the subject matter but this heart-warming and very personal story will engage anyone interested in the human condition. It's all here – life, love, ups and downs, tragedy and comedy, with a liberal smattering of the characters one meets along the way. Lily and “The Admiral” are characters to fall in love with. They would lend themselves to many a work of fiction. However, as this adventure shows, life needs no embroidering and the reader will need no encouragement to wander these waters from cover to cover.

Described as a different kind of road story, Boating with Buster introduces us to Alison Alderton’s world of boisterous Beagles and bothersome boats. It follows Alison, her husband and their Beagle on their adventures through England, Ireland and Northern Europe as far north as Scandinavia – no mean feat in their small Dutch barge called Lily! This book is a total joy to read while also very pleasing to the eye with the book having many beautiful photos taken around Europe on their travels.

I loved this eagerly awaited book. I've never met Alison and Roger in person but feel I know them through the love of dogs and boating. The book lived up to my expectations and more. Joy and sadness, humour and frustrations perfectly balanced resulting in a very satisfying and memorable read. Alison paints with words the way an accomplished artist constructs his/her pictures, the mind's eye is filled with colourful images that accompany the prose. Added to this are the many beautiful photographs and paw print graphics that embellish every page. I intended to take this book with my on my winter sojourn to Portugal where we like to escape the harsh UK winter. It was to be a coffee table book that I would dip into now and again and enjoy over a few weeks. Instead of which I couldn't resist starting it when it arrived at my home in early October and I finished within a few days! Well done Alison, Buster would be PROUD!!