Starred review from April 1, 2024
The rich and famous are just as obsessed with their pets as everyone else, according to this charming debut memoir from Attas, a veterinarian whose practice, City Pets, has been making house calls in New York City since 1992. Born in Queens, Attas was hired by an Upper East Side “Vet to the Stars” in 1987, but claims she was fired in a fit of jealousy after VIP client Joan Rivers specifically requested her services. Rivers went on to become a loyal supporter of Attas’s private practice, the client roster of which ballooned with celebrities. Chronicling her encounters with notable New Yorkers, Attas portrays them as by turns endearingly vulnerable and incomprehensibly weird: a bighearted but clueless Cher asks for a midnight appointment for a dog with a contagious case of mange that she’d found in Italy and flown all the way back to New York; an eye-contact avoidant Ivana Trump never takes Attas’s advice, and instead goes diagnosis shopping when she doesn’t like what she hears. Attas also recounts her mirror-opposite experiences with that other class of New Yorkers in need of house calls: the homebound and disabled (“I am pretty sure I was the only health care professional she had any contact with,” Attas writes of one such client). This bubbly tell-all has fascinating depths.
April 1, 2024
In this playful debut, Attas shares experiences from her 30-year career as Manhattan's first full-time house-call-only veterinarian. After a bumpy start as a young vet (including some embarrassing fainting spells and an unscrupulous boss), Attas starts her own clinic, treating, among others, the pets of some of Manhattan's wealthiest and best-known residents. As she lugs her equipment through the city, Attas takes readers to luxurious penthouses and squalid apartments to give routine vaccines and treat terminal illnesses. The pets are joined by their quirky humans, leading Attas to experience clients who are often entitled (one skirts quarantine laws for a cat by sneaking it into Europe on a private plane) and famous (Billy Joel's pug, Steve Martin's yellow Lab, and Cher's Italian street dog). There are entertaining tales of animal antics, like the cat who gets very high on catnip, and the dog who uses a Van Gogh as a potty. And, as we'd expect in a book about pets, tough moments of loss abound; Attas eloquently describes helping humans grieve the loss of their beloved fur-babies. VERDICT A sure hit for pet lovers and anyone looking to peek into the lives and homes of the Manhattan elite.--Erin Dagenais
Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
April 15, 2024
A veterinarian who makes house calls to pet owners of all kinds in Manhattan shares her unique insight. It is inevitable that this book about operating a house call veterinary practice in Manhattan for the last 30 years will draw comparisons to the work of famous vet and author James Herriot. In fact, Attas cites Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small as an inspiration to pursue veterinary medicine. Yet her memoir has a rhythm of its own that befits the differences between New York City and the English countryside. Attas describes her professional start at a high-end practice run by a veterinarian who jealously guarded A-list clientele. Her telling of the break she got from Joan Rivers is well worth the cost of the book, as is an unforgettable vignette about pornographer Al Goldstein's Vietnamese potbellied pig. Thankfully, the narrative is about much more than mere name-dropping. Her clients are famous and unknown, and the author has a gift for demonstrating how pets change human beings who live in penthouses and studio apartments alike. "Whether I'm trimming a billionaire's cat's nails or chatting with the building's doorman about his dog's limp," she writes, "I treat every client the same." Attas is perhaps at her most compelling when recounting her determination as an adolescent to become a veterinarian and the literal and figurative lengths to which she went to gain experience even before attending veterinary school. She also includes useful advice and tips for pet owners, including information about food, leashes for city dogs, the value of rescue animals, and quiet dangers that lurk in homes (cat owners, don't keep lilies). Attas has a sharp eye and an amusing, engaging style that bring to life the vagaries of Manhattan house calls and insight into the bonds that are established among veterinarians, clients, and pets. A delightful read.
COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
June 1, 2024
Home-care veterinarian Attas started as a child caring for her stuffed animals, then was cold-calling vets for a job at 13 and eventually graduated from the University of Pennsylvania's veterinary school. Attas first worked at Park East Animal Hospital, known to be a vet clinic for the rich and famous. This is where she first met Joan Rivers' dog, Spike. Shortly after their first encounter, though, Attas was fired, since her jealous boss did not look kindly on her ""stealing"" his VIP clients. Regardless, Rivers remained with her when she started a private, at-home practice. But this is not a book strictly about her celebrity clients--Attas also explores the ways pets provide support and comfort to their owners, whether rich or not. One client, a hoarder living in a run-down apartment, had a strong bond with her cat and was able to monitor its health with Attas' frequent visits. Attas thinks that the cat helped the woman maintain her independence. The insights into her clients' lives, both human and animal, as well as the tips for pet owners, make this a unique and enjoyable read.
COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.