This is definitely a far cry from the type of book I generally read - but oh, my, what an amazing book! Absolutely one of the best books I have ever read! I feel every single moment as Will went through it - I shed so many tears I'll be surprised if I have any left!! No matter what type of genre you prefer, pick up this book, I promise you won't be disappointed! This review is short on words but I can't describe how much I loved it.
Thanks to Will Chesney, Joe Layden, St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for the ARC.

This was a wonderfully written book. At times I was really caught off guard but the story keeps you going and wants you wanting more. I first of all want to say with gratitude, to the author, my sincere thanks for serving so relentlessly and for putting your story down on paper to share with the world. Thank you for your service and Thank you to Ciaro for his service! What an admirable dog! Thank you for sharing him with the world the way that you did! Your story is all too real and so very harsh at times, but that was the real experience you and others like you experience. I honor each of those who serve and for your families who sacrifice so much. You are an exceptional breed and should hold your head up high and feel proud for what you have accomplished so far in life. May you and others be blessed along life's journey. I gave you r book 4 stars, I am sorry for that. I had too because I have friends and family who would not appreciate the language which was at times raw and unfiltered. So Spoiler alert for those who do not want to read swear words such as the f-bomb!
Read around it! It's a great story and Will Chesney did a great job sharing his story!

I received a copy of this ebook in exchange for an honest review
This was incredible.. I bawled. I laughed. I squished my dogs extra hard after reading this. Incredible.

This was a great read, and one that unexpectedly pulled at the heartstrings. Cairo and Will have such an amazing releationship.

Hey folks, daddy Steve here with some doggiebooks talk. The latest book I finished reading over the weekend is No Ordinary Dog by Will Chesney, about a very special Belgian Malinois named Cairo. As you can read in the book summary included here, Cairo was part of the mission that went down to get Ossama bin Laden back in 2011. Will Chesney was his handler.
I find working dogs and particularly military working dogs (MWD) to be absolutely fascinating and this book does a great job of describing just about everything such dogs are required to be able to do. Simply amazing. The book takes a bit of time before getting into the doggie part with about the first third of it being about the specific training Will « Cheese » Chesney went through to become a Navy SEAL. I didn’t mind it too much because I thought it was also very interesting, and Chesney made up for that first part being about himself by writing a lot about Cairo in the rest of the book.
This one is a DEFINITE must read if you have any interest in what makes a good military working dog, especially the relation they have with their handler, or as Chesney puts it, their dad...
I’ve got to give you the usual disclaimer, that might be seen as a sort of spoiler, unless you are good at maths. Cairo came to the SEAL program in 2008, he was three. The bin Laden mission was in 2011 when he was six year old. You do the math. The book is a memoire and as such, there’s a rough part toward the end, if you can read between the line. Yeah, I cried, not ashamed to say it...
Huge thanks to NetGalley who provided a free eBook advanced reader’s copy in exchange for my honest review. This is as honest as it gets...

This book is a wonderful tribute to a true military hero. Will Chesney has always wanted to be a SEAL. He describes the difficult process of working his way through the SEAL training program, his first missions, then his introduction to the military working dog program. Cairo is perfect for the working dog program and he and Will have a strong connection from the start. This book tells how he becomes a true hero and saves so many lives.
I received a complimentary copy of this book through NetGalley. The views and opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

A wonderful read about how military working dogs and navy SEALS save and protect our lives everyday. The first 25 percent of the book, the author talks about his rigorous training to be a Navy SEAL. I found this part very interesting and couldn't believe the mental and physical strength needed to become part of this group. Then the author talks about becoming a dog handler and meeting Cairo and the various missions they went on. My pulse was literally racing as I was reading the part about the mission to find Osama bin Laden. I have read a few books on military working dogs and I am always awed by their fearlessness and bravery and how many lives they save on a daily basis. They are definitely unsung heroes.

Thank you to St Martin's Press and NetGalley for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

First off, I will read anything that involves animals and secondly one that shows how intelligent animals are is a book that I will naturally be drawn to.
The summary of this book states that only one name was released of the team responsible for capturing Osama bin Laden, at the time, and that is of a working military dog named Cairo, a Belgian Malinios. That event was only a small part of the story and instead focuses on Will Chesney and his training and career as a Navy Seal. During his time with the Seals, Will becomes a dog handler and this is where his and Cairo's stories became connected. We are led through the intensive training both man and dog must undergo to be a important and cohesive part of their teams.
I found this book to be a very interesting look into the training involved to become a Seal and equally interesting to see the life of a military dog portrayed. Will reveals the events of their lives together, both personal and career, with wit and compassion.
A very enjoyable book sure to be loved by all readers.
Highly recommend

I really enjoyed this book and debated about the 5 stars, but could really not justify a 4 . As a navy mom and a huge dog lover this really appealed to me. Will tells a very detailed background of the process he went through with his training to become a SEAL and Cairo the dog featured does not make an appearance until close to the 1/2 way point. There is a lot of bad language in this book most of which I know is part of the military life. But the storyline flows smoothly and kept my interest quite well.
A fascinating peek into the insides of the Navy life and especially what happens to bring down Bin Laden was a wonderful read for me and I think you will enjoy it as well. There is not much goriness in this book as opposed to most military set nonfictional accounts so I appreciated that.
The book is well written and flows through the events without jumping around through different times.
The publication date is set for April 21st of 2020 I received an advance e-copy of this title from NetGalley. All of the review is my opinion.

Moving story about the role of both the four-legged and two-legged Navy SEALS. Amazing detail about how they train and how they are willing to sacrifice for their country.

No Ordinary Dog is the story of Cairo, a military working dog, and the author Will Chesney, a former Navy SEAL. It is as much Will Chesney’s story as it is Cairo’s. In fact, the first 25% of this book is about the training that Navy SEALs undergo. After seeing some military working dogs in action during a deployment in Afghanistan, Chesney develops an interest in becoming a dog handler, and during his dog handler training Chesney is paired up with Cairo.

After training, Chesney and Cairo go on 2 deployments as members of a Navy SEAL team in Afghanistan, and they also participate in the mission that ended up killing Osama Bin Laden. It was interesting to read about how helpful dogs are to the teams that they work with. I have some mixed feelings about putting these animals in situations of such danger without their having a choice in the matter. I say mixed because I don’t doubt that these types of working dogs like and enjoy the types of tasks that they perform, and I do think that they have helped save the lives of many soldiers by finding, flushing out, and neutralizing enemies that soldiers may not be aware of. However, sometimes these dogs do die in the line of duty, and Cairo himself is seriously wounded in one raid.

Cairo’s personality definitely comes through in this book. He is a laid-back, friendly, and loyal dog who is also quite good at his job of sniffing out explosives, chasing down ‘bad guys’, and helping to clear buildings. He’s also a determined and hard-working dog who successfully comes back from a near-fatal injury. It’s heartbreaking to read that after his retirement, when Cairo comes to live with Chesney, that he seems to suffer from PTSD just as much as Chesney (and many other soldiers).

I found this book to be engagingly and interestingly written, and never a chore to read. I would recommend it to those who are interested in the bond between humans and dogs as well as people interested in the role of Navy SEALs in the U.S. military. Chesney clearly loved Cairo very much, and their relationship is quite touching.

No Ordinary Dog is the story of Will Chesney, a Navy SEAL, and his canine partner, Cairo, and their exploits throughout their careers. The story begins with Will entering the Navy, determined to be a Navy Seal, follows him through basic and SEAL training, through his becoming a dog handler and through his career with his partner, canine Cairo. It was definitely interesting to read about how the military’s working dogs were acquired, trained and used. I do think there was a bit much about Navy SEAL training (at least one-third or more of the book), as I got a bit tired of the lengthy descriptions of SEAL training and the shaping of Will’s Navy career. I personally would have preferred more time spent on his interactions and time spent with Cairo, to the sometimes-lengthy descriptions of training and how the Navy operates. After all, the blurbs focus, for the most part is on this being a book about a dog, not about how SEAL’s are trained and how one reacted to the training. That information is in many, many other books. I do realize that information was necessary to put it all in context, but just not so much or in such detail. It was interesting to read the snapshots of the missions the pair were involved in, to include the Osama bin Laden mission. The book also demonstrates the close affinity between the dog and his handler that only grows deeper and stronger as time goes on. All in all, it was a fairly good book and will probably be of interest to many readers. I received this from NetGalley to read and review.

A lovely tribute to one of the milks four rooted heros!! I cried and cheered, a must read for anyone!!

No Ordinary Dog is an up close and personal story that follows the life of Will, a young man who knew he was destined to be a Navy Seal and Cairo, an extraordinary military working dog who saved Will's life. We follow Will through basic training, getting picked for Seal training, the different phases of BUD/S, the friendships, and the mental and physical exhaustion he experiences daily. As he moves through training, Will is introduced to the military working dog program, and gets to see up close how amazing these dogs are.

Cairo and Will become partners and work side by side on many missions, which further strengthens the bond that these two have. In 2011, Will and Cairo become a part of Operation Neptune Spear, which resulted in the successful elimination of bin Laden.

As time goes on, we see Will and Cairo work together and save each others lives again and again. While we get an in depth look into both human and dog military life, this book also shows the incredible bond that can develop between a man and his dog.

Reading this book was an emotional rollercoaster, and I often found myself feeling several emotions at once. It was interesting to learn more about the Seal team process and how amazing military working dogs are. While there was a lot of repetitive writing, I would recommend this book to anyone, as the relationship between Will and Cairo is just too special to pass up.

This was no ordinary book for me.
It's about a lot of things. Mainly it is about a bond and partnership between a SEAL and his extraordinary military working dog. However it also gave me insight into the author's military career, detailing how he grinded his way into the Navy SEALs and made it into the elite Team Six, his deployments, becoming a dog handler, the raid on Bin Laden's compound, along the injury that eventually ended his career.
Throughout his career, you continually see the impact that his dog, Cairo had on his career, but most importantly his life.
I am not the best with expression, and I am not sure how to put into words how beautifully and thoughtfully this book was written, or the impact it had on me personally.
I will say that this book allowed me to feel hope that there is life worth living, even when knowing you will never be the same as you were before, even after losing friends and loved ones, even with PTSD.
I never took for granted the comfort and feeling of "safeness" that my dogs have granted me, but in reading this book, I am reminded that there are people who understand just how life saving their presence can be.

Thank you to St Martin's Press and to NetGalley for giving me access to the digital galley.

This was a wonderful book. I could hardly put it down. If you love the military and dogs, you will love this book.

I just finished reading this book, and really wanted to type up this review while my emotions surrounding it are still fresh. Do you know how some books affect you, and change how you view things in your world? This book ended up being one of those for me.

The first part of the book starts out with details of SEAL training - it was well-written, but not very different from other books that I read. The next portion of the book talks about how the military acquires their Combat Attack Dogs and goes about training them. I never knew that the majority of them come from Europe, or why a Belgian Malinois might be preferred over a German Shepard for some roles (size/weight). I have known about Military Working Dogs being used to detect IED's, find targets, etc., but I really hadn't known much about their training or use as Combat Attack Dogs. This book takes us through the process of selection, training, and also how the handlers are matched with their dogs; I found this interesting.

There are 2 things that I feel really sets this book apart from others that I have read previously. First and foremost, it is clear to see the bond that Will developed with Cairo. A lot of us pet owners know the depth of the love you can feel for a pet, but you can tell that Cairo is not only loved by Will, but deeply RESPECTED. He is not a pet, or a tool used during a time of war, but a Brother-In-Arms. He has been in the trenches with Will, including the Osama Bin Laden raid he is famous for, and Will trusts him to do his job as a professional. We also see Will's devotion to Cairo as he is injured during a mission, and then also later on in his life when his health is failing.

The second thing that sets this book apart from me is Will's willingness to share his own struggles and vulnerability with the reader. For someone who has been at the top of their game, it must be difficult to not only lose that edge, but to admit when you have struggles and then to share them with others takes a lot of courage. It made me feel connected to Will and Cairo's story, and really made me appreciate (even more) the sacrifices they made for our country and our freedom.

What really sets this book apart for me, and what is behind my 5 star rating, is the heart that clearly shines through in this one.

Really interesting insight into the SEAL team life, as well as the life of military working dogs. I was drawn in immediately to the how and why of how things worked, and realized very quickly that it takes a special kind of person (and dog!) to be a part of that life.

This is the interesting and heartwarming tale about a Navy SEAL dog handler and his dog. I read the uncorrected proof and a few typos were noted, but for the most part, the writing style is spot on and the story is told in chronological order. I recommend this read to people interested in the working life of military persons and working dogs. You won't be sorry if you pick up a copy.

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for providing a copy of this book to read and review. The opinions expressed here are my own honest opinions.

I don't have the words to tell you how good this book was. All I can say is this is a book that will stay with you long after you have read the last page. If you love dogs and all the freedoms we have because of the wonderful brave people in our military, grab this book. This is a book I will buy when it is released. Thank you St. Martin's Press via NetGalley for the ARC copy of this awesome book. All opinions expressed are my own.