A Series of Opinionated Animals

In A Series of Opinionated Animals (Bancroft Press), Lerner, a Harvard-educated lawyer and animal advocate, recounts the unlikely encounters that led her to a life devoted to animals in need. What begins with a panicked call about Monster, a neurologically impaired squirrel whose unusual friendship with a rabbit may save him from falling into the hands of the state, grows into a world populated by disabled sheep with a taste for blue corn chips, rescue dogs, abandoned cats, and a disabled ex-police horse named Shire. Through these encounters, Lerner discovers that caring for other species can mean challenging the boundaries of law, justice, grief, and love, and giving a voice to those who cannot advocate for themselves. Her bond with Shire ultimately leads her into animal law, where she helps establish one of the nation’s first student animal law programs at Harvard. Funny, candid, and deeply moving, the memoir considers what it means to recognize the individuality of other creatures and to extend our ideas of family, compassion, and justice beyond our own species.