In Understanding Patches, a talented pooch, "Patches," shows his clever canine stuff here. A young girl, Alyssa, gets a constant canine companion.

Outside a cave near their home, they meet a dazed stranger and invite him to dinner. Two surveyors had disappeared while surveying the region near that cave. Was this man one of them? The cave held a captive. Stan found himself surrounded by fallen sandstone. Something hard, shiny, and yellow was revealed. Gold tests brotherly love. A tornado tests a young romance.

At RAS, the trainers develop several successful dog behavior routines using rewards, not punishment. The mood at RAS remains upbeat, even after the tornado.

As is often the case in Riverview, a mystery and romance are just around the corner.

In Understanding Queenie, Helen A. Bemis welcomes you to the city of Riverview. There, you will meet a woman in the Witness Protection program with her Pit Bull Terrier canine partner, Queenie. "Mary" is living a new secret identity and finds it a bit challenging.

It gets lonely in Witness Protection, but that is better than getting killed. The central character, Mary, adopts a new name and a new home. Soon, she adopts Queenie, a Pit Bull Terrier, for companionship and protection. Mary starts volunteering at the Riverview Animal Shelter (RAS). She hopes for peace and safety, but the criminal Mary has helped convict has other plans.

Being in witness protection in Riverview proved confining. Her assigned protector proved physically capable but emotionally vulnerable. A Pit Bull Terrier, Queenie, might make the difference between Mary's safety and being a victim.

At the Riverview Animal Shelter, trainers plan upcoming classes using the principles of reward incentives rather than punishments. Dogs and owners respond favorably. The reader will gain an appreciation of this approach, which is detailed here.

These novels join Helen A. Bemis's Riverview Animal Shelter series of fictional stories, which center on a fictional small town, its people, their pets, and Riverview's medium-size mysteries. All her novels reflect professional dog trainer and evaluator Helen A. Bemis's emphasis on the value of greater understanding among people and their pets and the power of love.

The author obtained a college degree at SUNY Adirondack, earned the Certified Professional Dog Trainer international certification, and has a successful business, K-9 Karing. She has been a Therapy Dog evaluator and is an A. K. C. award evaluator. She has judged fun dog matches, often speaks to many organizations, and teaches dog safety and other dog-related topics to schools and her local college.

She has published over twenty novels about Riverview.