Fifteen Dogs characters

Appears from the start

A Greek god who argues that animals would be even more miserable than humans if given human intelligence. He accepts a wager with Hermes and grants consciousness to the dogs staying overnight at a Toronto veterinary clinic.

Appears from the start

The Greek god who disputes Apollo's bleak judgment of mortals. He wagers that if dogs receive human intelligence, at least one will die happy, and he follows the animals' lives with sympathy while remaining bound by the terms of the bet.

Appears from the start

A powerful mastiff who emerges as the leader of the escaped dogs. He values the inherited order of canine life and sees the new capacity for abstract thought as a threat to the pack's unity and to his authority.

Appears from the start

A black poodle among the dogs transformed by Apollo and Hermes. Thoughtful and independent, he is less willing than Atticus to suppress the dogs' new intelligence and eventually seeks a way to live in the human city.

Appears from the start

A small, clever dog whose intelligence is joined to a strong instinct for self-preservation. He reads the pack's shifting loyalties quickly and attaches himself to those most likely to protect him.

Appears from the start

One of the transformed dogs and the most devoted to the language the pack invents. He delights in sound, pattern, and metaphor, composing poems that preserve a distinctly canine way of sensing the world.

First appears in chapter 2

A Toronto woman who takes in Majnoun and treats him as a thinking companion rather than a pet. Patient and curious, she builds a shared vocabulary with him and tries to understand the boundaries between human and canine experience.

First appears in chapter 2

Nira's husband. He is less comfortable than she is with Majnoun's unusual awareness and with the intense bond that develops between the woman and the dog.