Hank the Cowdog Review

January 16, 2010 | By heidijo In Homeschooling, Reviews |

I have been asked to review the
Hank the Cow Dog books, tapes and game. We have never heard of these books before although they seem to be very popular on the Internet and have been around for 26 years.

Our favorite part of the review package was definitely the Tornado game. My daughter (13) and my son (7) both liked the game. One night when my daughter had a friend over to spend the night, I found her taking the game into her room for them to play while they stayed up a little later than normal. My son requested to play the game in place of our night time reading.

The figures on the game are cute and unique. The folds up for easy storage and all the pieces are stored inside the folded up game! Each player gets Hank the Cowdog, Drover, and Junior the Buzzard for their game pieces. We weren’t quite sure which circle each figure was supposed to start on, but that didn’t make much difference in the fun of the game. The game reminds me of the old game “Trouble” that I used to play as a child.

We also received the book Hank the Cowdog – The Case of the One-Eyed Killer Stud Horse – #8 in the series of 54 books and Tales and Truths from Hank the Cowdog. The book is a chapter book and the CD has a collection of 9 songs from the books along with 10 story excerpts from the books.

The books and stories seem to appeal more to children under 10 and especially boys. The songs are fun and enjoyable for the most part. The stories and songs are basically the adventures of 2 silly dogs. They deal with issues like befriending the unlovely, dealing with liars, and other character issues.

Although the books deal with character qualities, I was bothered by some of the themes and phrases in the stories. There were references to murder and having a girlfriend which might be themes that are too mature for young listeners.

The parts of the story that bothered me the most were the references to wetting the bed and then lying to your parents saying that it rained in the night and the roof leaked. Some families might not think anything of these references because they were two silly dogs talking, but others might want to know about these references in case they want to avoid those parts of the book or avoid those stories.

The positives of these books are that they deal with issues head-on and aren’t afraid to talk about tough issues. They also have fun with the songs and with each other and remain good friends even in the tough times.

The negatives were mentioned above with the negative attitudes and dialogue.

On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being best – for this Hank the Cowdog review I would give the game a 9 and the books a 5. You can purchase the game, books and CDs at their website Hank the Cowdog.