Pinkerton doesn't understand his owner's commands. When told to come, he jumps out the window. When asked to fetch, he destroys the slippers instead. Pinkerton's desperate owners take him to obedience school, but he flunks out in record time. Then one night a burglar breaks into their house, and Pinkerton is able to put his bad habits to good use. This silly charmer of a story was included on the Booklist and Horn Book best of the year lists and inspired four sequels about the impossibly clueless but irresistibly sweet Pinkerton.

"Can a dog with more sweetness than smarts become a hero?" --cover. Original edition first published in the United States of America by Dial Books for Young Readers, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 1979. This edition first published by Dial Books for Young Readers, 2014.