Monk and Natalie come straight from a family reunion to a missing persons case concerning an artist named Amanda Castle. Despite his misgivings, Monk agrees to take in her beloved pet, Shelby, and finds himself becoming attached to the dog. Then some hikers find Amanda's body and Shelby becomes the near-victim of a mysterious hit-and-run. Can Monk sniff out the killer and bring justice to his newest friend?
This episode includes examples of the following tropes:
- Absence of Evidence: When Monk asks the crowd to raise their hand if they are guilty of Amanda's death, DeWitt is the only one who doesn't look around.
- Alphabetical Theme Naming: Shelby's litter is christened by Monk as Exhibits A, B, C and D.
- Anti-Villain: Yes, DeWitt is guilty of obstruction and manslaughter, but Monk recognizes the latter was an accident. What's more, he sees that despite all attempts on Shelby's life, DeWitt couldn't be so heartless that he would outright kill a mother dog and her puppies. Ultimately, DeWitt relents and admits the puppies are beautiful.
- Artistic License – Animal Care: At one point, Monk makes it a point to bring home a treat for Shelby. Unfortunately, what he buys is ice cream, which isn’t healthy for canines — they normally have significant trouble digesting dairy. Worse yet, he says he brought home all the flavors they offer; presumably this would include chocolate and/or coffee based varieties, both of which are poisonous for dogs.
- Carpet-Rolled Corpse: Amanda's body is found in the mountains, wrapped in a rug.
- Casting Gag: When Monk is taking care of Amanda Castle's dog Shelby, Natalie hands him a catch-in-action pooper scooper to help him clean up after her. But what's better? It's a Sha-Poopie! Tony's brother Dan pitched it on American Inventor in 2006 but it got rejected.
- Character Development: Zigzagged. Monk starts out uneasy about taking care of a dog, if not unwilling to take one in so as to avoid her getting euthanized. Although initially worried about Shelby's uncleanliness, Monk warms up to her, at least to the point where he pets her with gloves on. However, after learning Shelby's having puppies (at the last minute), he relapses into treating her like a leper and refusing to touch her. Natalie is the one to lampshade that he's opened his heart to Shelby and that he shouldn't close it again just because the miracle of birth makes him uncomfortable. Sure enough, once Shelby's first puppy is born, Monk opens his heart towards the mother dog again (at least in part because the puppies could be evidence used to put Amanda Castle's killer away). By the end of the episode, before she goes off Monk finds it in his heart to pet her with an ungloved hand before he has to say good-bye to her.
- The Cloud Cuckoolander Was Right: When Randy theorizes that the driver who nearly hit Shelby was Amanda's killer trying to eliminate a witness, Stottlemeyer passes it off immediately, given that animals can't testify. Randy's theory turns out to be accurate in that DeWitt was trying to kill Shelby, given that his dog was the father of her puppies and the puppies could have ruined his story that he and Amanda didn't know each other.
- Continuity Snarl: Monk adopts the dog for a few days, despite his landlord stating there was a no pet policy in his apartment's building Mr. Monk and the Panic Room.
- Cross-Cast Role: Shelby is supposedly female, but the dog portraying her is actually male.
- A Deadly Affair: Steven DeWitt accidentally kills his lover Amanda Castle when she discovers he is married.
- Death by Falling Over: DeWitt shoves his mistress Amanda as he's trying to keep her from disposing of signs of his marriage, and her head hits the kitchen counter on the way down. She doesn't go out like a light, though; she staggers to her feet and dials 911 before losing consciousness.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: Monk only adopted Shelby at Natalie's insistence. Throughout the course of the episode, it really shows that he's come to care for his new charge.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: After the birth of her pups, Shelby acts ashamed as Monk tells her "You have a lot of explaining to do, young lady". This bears a resemblance to a father expressing disappointment to his teen daughter for getting pregnant.
- Dog Got Sent to a Farm: An unusual example. When Monk gets the news of Amanda's death, he tells Shelby that she's not returning and she went to a beautiful farm with lots of cool features. However, then he decides he's not fooling anyone and just sympathizes with Shelby over her grief.
- Joggers Find Death: A variant; Amanda's body finally turns up when a dad takes his sons on a hiking trip and they find the rug. When they poke at it, it unrolls, dumping her body on the ground.
- Licked by the Dog: In spite of Monk's odd and sometimes insensitive behavior, Shelby takes a liking to him from the moment he starts investigating her owner's disappearance. Monk reacts in horror when she literally licks him.
- Make the Dog Testify: When Randy theorizes the driver who tried to run over Shelby was Amanda's killer trying to eliminate a witness, Captain Stottlemeyer tells Randy that there is a law prohibiting animals from testifying. Randy responds that it could easily be changed, as it is California, where stranger things happen every day.
- Murder by Inaction: While the shove that caused Amanda's fatal head injury happened by accident, DeWitt hangs up on the 911 operator without giving her any information to save his mistress.
- Secret Test: Out of the blue, Monk calls to the search party that he thinks one of them killed Amanda and asks the murderer to raise their hand. Nobody raises their hand, but Steven DeWitt doesn't look around like everyone else either.
- Seeking the Missing, Finding the Dead: The investigation starts as a missing persons case. Of course, the viewer knows Amanda died, and some minor characters find her body halfway through the episode.
- Surprise Litter of Puppies: Shelby is an extra special case, as Monk didn't know she was pregnant until the last moment when she was in labor.
- Talking Animal: While she stops short of actually talking, the episode portrays Shelby as having an almost human understanding. She seems to be genuinely sorrowful when Monk tells her that her owner died, and her reaction when giving birth is similar to a human.
- Television Geography: When pointing out the places Amanda Castle's body is not located, Randy puts a pin on what he notes is "the park we checked yesterday." Said park on the map is Lafayette Park, which is a small inner city park between Laguna Street and Gough Street, and definitely not a grassy clearing surrounded by mountains like the field the search party checks out.
- Toilet-Drinking Dog Gag: When Monk returns with water for Shelby, he finds her gone. He investigates and finds her thirstily slurping up water from the toilet bowl, to his horror.
- You Are Not Alone: After Amanda's body turns up, Monk comforts Shelby, telling her that she's not alone. He repeats it at the end after one of Natalie's relatives offers to adopt her and the whole litter.
- You Wouldn't Shoot Me: Stephen DeWitt breaks into Monk's apartment to kill Shelby before her puppies can ruin his assertion that he and Amanda didn't know each other. When Monk steps between them, he looks at the man's shaking knife hand and says that he doesn't think DeWitt is a killer.
