The Pack is Back

Three Labrador puppies face steep life challenges as they discover their identity, learn to overcome conflict and rebuild their pack.

The stories are based on the author’s close observation of the dogs’ behaviour as they respond to jealousy, conflict, being lost, found, hurt, healed, grief, friendship and the joy of belonging to their pack.

Children want to know about real life, and the dogs’ experiences provide a window to children’s own highs and lows, safely at one remove.

The seven illustrated stories tell a big tale about canine and human life, today and in the deep past.

The stories begin when the dogs were born, when they were One Litter with One Mother.

As puppies, they were taken to separate homes. The One Pack family was lost.

Everything in the stories really happened, just as it is told.

Sara Savage is a social cognitive psychologist. She was based at the University of Cambridge for her doctoral work in 1994 and worked there as a researcher until 2022, when she formed IC Educational Ltd. She is co-founder of the IC thinking approach and has authored 37 publications on preventing social polarisation and extremism along with three popular-level books. IC thinking interventions developed by Sara and her colleagues have been delivered in twelve countries in schools, communities and displaced person camps, to address a wide range of extreme thinking, with statistically significant results. Sara’s background in dance and the arts has influenced the writing of The Pack is Back, her first children’s book.