Book review: ‘Your Animal — Your Soul Mirror’

Your Animal — Your Soul Mirror: Healing the Emotional Wounds of Animals and Their People by Tammy Billups. Bear & Company, 2025. Softcover, 272 pages.

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In many traditions and cultures throughout history, the archetype of the “wisewoman” described women who — as intuitives, herbalists, or healers — held special gifts. In modern times, such wisewomen still exist. But unlike their historical counterparts who were often reviled, wisewomen today often feel safe enough to share their spiritual knowledge.

A leading wisewoman who works with animals and people’s connection to them is animal communicator Tammy Billups. Tammy, whose past books include Animal Soul Contracts and Animal Wayshowers, returns with an especially relevant book in our sometimes chaotic world: Your Animal — Your Soul Mirror.

In this new work, Tammy explores the emotional wounds (often unacknowledged) that can cause companion animals and their people to remain “stuck” in unhelpful or damaging behavior patterns. By identifying such patterns and the emotional scars they can cause, the author leads readers through exercises and practices to help them release themselves from cycles of stagnated behavior and move on to a more grounded and healthier life.

As Tammy has chronicled in her earlier books, our animals often come to us with emotional wounds of their own and are the catalysts for mutual healing. Over my decades of reading books by animal communicators, I have not found one who writes from the heart with as much clarity as Tammy Billups does. If you are already familiar with her work, you will find her trademark caring approach in Your Animal — Your Soul Mirror. If you are new to this field or find yourself a little skeptical, pick up a copy and read it with an open mind; you just might be surprised by the wisdom you encounter.

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Our goal at Best Friends is to support all animal shelters in the U.S. in reaching no-kill. No-kill means saving every dog and cat in a shelter who can be saved, accounting for community safety and good quality of life for pets. 

Shelter staff can’t do it alone. Saving animals in shelters is everyone’s responsibility, and it takes support and participation from the community. No-kill is possible when we work together thoughtfully, honestly, and collaboratively.