For the first time ever we feature four magazines in our What Hot and What’s New.  It is a tribute to our four legged friends and the two new magazines launched in their honor.  So without further due, here are this week’s hot new magazines:

The American Dog
www.theamericandogmag.com
$5.95

Because European dogs have apparently become overrated, I bring you The American Dog, a magazine born from the merger of The Colorado Dog and The Chicago Dog in the hope of capitalizing on the nationalistic dog lovers trend in the United States.

The American Dog is a magazine devoted dogs and how they interact with your family and your lifestyle. It has a lot of really good content for dog and animal lovers alike in that the content does a good job of speaking to the magazine’s target audience, dog lovers.

Putting the content aside, the layout looked really busy. They could have had fewer stories in the magazine and spread the stories out over several pages, having multiple spreads for some of the stories. It would have definitely added to the content and brought out some of the photos, which fit well with the stories.

On the whole the magazine is definitely worth picking up the next time you are at the magazine rack.

Bone-A-Fide Mutts
www.boneafidemutts.com
$4.99

Why would someone want a plain old mutt, when they could have a Bon-A-Fide Mutt?

Bone-A-Fide Mutts is the magazine targeted at the owner of mutts or mixed breed pets. It offers readers the lighter side of pet ownership, giving readers basic tips on dog ownership and inspirational stories about dogs in our everyday life. It also has a level of approachability that you don’t see in other pet magazines.

While the layout can be a little cheesy at times, the content does a good job of carrying on a conversation with the intended audience, and, at a time when people are looking for a way to escape the daily grind, Bone-A-Fide Mutts provides readers with a way to make that escape with their pet.

So, pick up a copy of Bone-A-Fide Mutts. It'll be worth the read.

Pain Pathways
www.painpathways.org

Any one that doubts the future of specialized magazines need look no further than Pain Pathways. It used to be the case that when people were in pain, they would reach for their Aspirin bottle and would try to do anything they could to keep the pain off their minds. Apparently, people have finally decided to give up and focus all of their energy on their pain, or at least that is what the people at Pain Pathways hope happens.

Pain Pathways is the magazine for those of you who don’t want to just be in pain, but read about the various aspects of pain and how others who are in pain dealt with it. It has features on those who’ve dealt with pain along with articles on the various aspects of pain, such as depression, drug interaction problems and patient trials.

So, the next time you find that you are in pain, you don’t have to suffer alone. Pick up a copy of Pain Pathways and you can ride out the pain together. 

Jane and Jane
www.janeandjane.net
$4.99

We often use Jane and John Doe to refer to the generic man and woman. Well, Jane and Jane is the magazine for the generic lesbian couple. While it says on the cover that it focuses on sophisticated living for lesbian lifestyles, giving you the expectation that you are going to see content for a more affluent reader, it falls short in that regard. Instead it gives you a general interest magazine for lesbians.

But, as a general interest magazine for lesbian women, Jane and Jane, in its first national issue,  does provide some good content. It has special interviews with prominent gay women and focuses its issues on special topics like mind, body and spirit. It also has several recurring sections such as relationships, journey, palate, domicile, finance and culture.

While the cover looked good, the execution on the inside wasn’t always perfect. There were some awkward looking layouts mixing advertising and editorials and, in fact, some articles that blurred the line between advertisement and editorial.

With few changes, Jane and Jane could be a great general interest magazine for the lesbian woman or better yet the affluent lesbian woman.