Alex, I'm curious: do you like dogs? I'm wondering whether an affinity for dogs will make a reader more likely to appreciate this story.
Well, I do like dogs... As well as I like cats and birds and hamsters.
That is to say, I'm not crazy about them.
I know about Laika because I wrote a story about her. The Soviet Union made the world think that she died due to the depletion of oxygen, which wasn't the case. She died because the payload fail to uncouple, causing the ship to overheat. Details here:
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/sad-story-laika-space-dog-and-her-one-way-trip-orbit-1-180968728/The story also has a sense decay throught, but ends with hope. There's also the plot twist. (Of course, the speculative element had to exist so the story couldn't be published here). Reminded me of
The Plague Dogs.
However (and answering your question), I think you're missing the point. The reason I like this story is mostly because of the human part. I understood the message about motherhood. If you suggest this story to a friend who's a dog-person and she ends up liking it, it's because she related to the burden of the mother; she suddenly became aware of what her mother had to sacrifice to take care of her, and she always took that for granted. It's not because she likes dogs.
I've studied some Freudian and Jungian psychology about mothers, and I also read a lot of stories about it. If you're into comics, consider giving "A Trail of Blood", by Shuzo Oshimi, a try (it's darker, be advised). I wrote yet another story about this, but I'm having a hard time getting it published because of the overt sexual themes.
Although I'm a man and will never know what it's like to carry a baby, have post-partum depression and things like that, I can raise an awareness about it by consuming these stories. I don't get mad if a baby starts crying next to me in the train, and I gladly give my seat to others.
As I said, every story is about humans and the human condition.
Isaac Asimov never wrote a line about robots in his entire life. I think I got a little nerdy writing this