Dickey has done an exceptional amount of both primary and secondary source research, citing a whole swathe of researchers I’ve read (which is very pleasing to my ego) as well as talking to people behind research I haven’t read but have heard of, and scads of people I haven’t even heard of.
The organization, the progression you go through with Dickey, is stunning–non-chronological, but logical and leading you from point to point without dropping. And throughout the whole book, start to finish, Dickey makes sure you remember that “the pit bull” and POC, especially Black and Hispanic Americans, have been extensively paired together, creating shared associations of violence. Most writings on pits leave aside the human dimension, and while you can read plenty of books and articles on how to handle dog-dog aggression, and fewer but still many on dog-human aggression, there are very, very few on why the pit bull. And why not the shar-pei.