When Bernard Cartwright, aged 54 and with a wife and four children, was ‘shed’ from his high-powered job as a TV director, other work was hard to find.

Bernard felt he was going to the dogs - and he was!

Taking on the role of Dog Warden for the City of Worcester, he donned his rottweiler-proof suit and helmet, and patrolled the historic town looking for dogs in trouble.

Then there were the owners! Like the seductive Emily Wantuch, Natasha the gypsy princess, Zorba Athalos the troubled foulee and Mr Navelhazy, drunk in charge of a whippet. Some were kind, some cruel, some were mad, and some violent.

His journey through the life of Worcester, by turns hilarious, tragic and reflective, was also an inner quest for Bernard as he and his family came to terms with what had befallen them.

There were barking dogs, biting dogs, dogs lost, abandoned, injured and abused. There was Rinty the sympathy dog, stuck under the floorboards, Tosca, the poodle with dreadlocks who terrified postmen, and the Malamute that failed to drown Bernard’s Christmas swan.