The Star Dog (Russian: Звёздный пёс) is a 2000 children's sci-fi novel by Kir Bulychev from his Alice, Girl from the Future series, one of the few books set explicitly in a Shared Universe with Bulychev's Intergalactic Police cycle.
The Star Dog is a Heroic Dog who lives with eccentric Wealthy Philanthropist Bakshtir (an extremely unsuccessful advisor to kings who, it's implied, has accumulated all his wealth thanks to kings paying him to get rid of him and his advice). The Star Dog can teleport instantly across space and can learn a single word and repeat it later all the time; so one day, he appears in Moscow, finds Alice and says "Cold!"
Alice starts to investigate what it might mean, and eventually finds out that a sinister and mysterious crime boss Besf is stealing heat and energy from different planets. To achieve his goals, he has organized a school for juvenile delinquents – so Alice goes a short while back in time to infiltrate the school as young criminal "Alla Zwei-Drei" and prevent the accomplishment of Besf's plans.
Tropes featured in the novel:
- Aloof Leader, Affable Subordinate: Dobrets (whose name literally means "a kind guy") is the more personable minion of reclusive General Besf. Subverted, since they turn out to be the same person.
- Bad People Abuse Animals: Among the lessons taught at Besf's school, there's cruelty to animals.
- Brainless Beauty: Basilisk is a handsome and athletic boy, but he is also extremely stupid.
- Brainwashed and Crazy: At one point, the students at Besf's school are drugged into blindly worshipping their teachers. Alice manages to escape it by giving her portion of the drug to Valera.
- The Bully: At Besf's school, bullying is the doctrine. The students are constantly taught to abuse anyone who's weaker than them.
- Evil Laugh: When "Alla Zwei-Drei" laughs at the very first lesson, several students hide under their desks.
- The Infiltration: Alice infiltrates Besf's School for Horrible Children in the guise of a juvenile delinquent.
- Meaningful Name: Some names and nicknames in Besf's gang are indeed fitting, others... not so much.
- "Mily" means "sweet, dear" in Russian, leading to Sweet Mila's original nickname (Milaya Mila) being a case of Added Alliterative Appeal. However, she isn't sweet in the least, being a vicious and vengeful matron of the School for Horrible Children.
- "Dobry" means "kind". Dobrets is the tutor of the School for Horrible Children and also General Besf himself.
- Played straight with Monsieur de Pockett, who teaches pickpocketing.
- Played likewise straight with Scorpon, who is a bully and teaches cruelty to animals.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: Alice hides a good deal of her actual intelligence, completely fooling the School for Horrible Children's students and staff, including Besf himself.
- Pragmatic Villainy: Invoked. "Alla Zwei-Drei" skips the cruelty to animals class, claiming it's useless. Stealing, though, is profitable, so she steals Scorpon's purse and goes to buy ice cream.
- Self-Made Orphan: "Alla Zwei-Drei" claims to have killed her parents and grandmother.
- Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: Played with. Jimmy certainly sees himself as "Alla Zwei-Drei"'s Arch-Enemy, but since she easily defeats him most of the times, she views him more like a minor nuisance.
- Verbal Tic: Dobrets's every phrase is punctuated with "kind of" and "you understand". This helps Alice identify him as one and the same person with General Besf, who has the same tic.
- Wouldn't Hit a Girl: At the fighting lesson, Valera gets punished for refusing to fight Alice on the grounds she's a girl. Sweet Mila angrily tells him that weak people are the best targets for hitting (though she soon finds out "Alla Zwei-Drei" is far from weak).
