Campaign Trail Tale: LaRue for Mayor: Letters from the Campaign Trail by Mark Teague

That king of the canine correspondents is back. Yes, it's Ike LaRue, that enfant terrible of terriers, who finds his inner civil libertarian in Mark Teague's latest, Letters from the Campaign Trail: LaRue for Mayor.

When doggie delinquents overturn a hot-dog car at a campaign rally, Ike's owner, Mrs. Gertrude LaRue is hurt and hospitalized, and Candidate Bugwort thinks he's found the law and order issue that will carry him into the Snort City mayor's mansion. The Snort City Register-Gazette's headlines scream out his plan.

BUGWORT CALLS FOR CANINE CRACKDOWN
Complete Ban on Animals in Public Places

Enjoying his vacation from Mrs. LaRue's supervision, Ike is roaming and frolicking with his chums Chewy, Fifi, and Buck from the Feisty Paws Club, stealing the double-play ball from the town baseball game, swiping the catch from the Fishing Derby, and holding a heist of Rocky Road ice cream from the Mr. Ding-A-Ling truck. But the prospect of being banned from his free-range romping rouses Ike, who mounts a shadow campaign against Bugwort with the help of his doggie accomplices, who plaster VOTE FOR IKE and I LIKE IKE signs all over town. After all, Ike writes to Mrs. LaRue, "if dogs are banned, cats will run wild!" "Operation Underdog" is soon underway.

Ike LaRue organizes his confederate canines to disrupt Bugwort's next public rally, setting up distracting groups of "barkers," "tail chasers," and "howlers" among the crowd. The ploy so discombobulates Bugwort that he faints and falls from the podium. It is only Ike LaRue's quick resuscitation skills and prompt commandeering of the nearest Mr. Ding-A-Ling truck as an emergency vehicle that restores Bugwort--that and the administration of the proper dosage of Rocky Road ice cream en route to the ER.

The revived Bugwort, of course, undergoes a complete change of mind about the social value of dogs and selflessly shares the ticket with Ike as candidate for assistant mayor.

"BUGWORT AND LARUE: A KINDER, GENTLER SNORT CITY," the new posters proclaim, just as Gertrude LaRue is discharged to find her pooch-cum-politician the town hero yet again.

Mark Teague's illustrations for the Ike LaRue series are absolutely wonderful, full of sly details and wonderful facial expressions which tell a tale very different from the well spun doggy dispatches Ike sends to Mrs. LaRue as the true story unfolds. Fans of the other two books will not want to miss this one!