A nostalgic coming-of-age story set in the Old West. Young Allen North leaves his family's ranch to set out on his own. While working as a ranch hand, he learns what it means to have a mentor, make friends and battle bad guys, and is lucky to discover what it means to fall in love. But first he has to prove himself by not letting an ornery old horse named Alice get the better of him. Outlaw Simon Blackburn, who finds trouble wherever he goes and known for shooting his victims in the back, is on the trail to find and kill Allen after a gun fight that left his two cattle-thieving brothers dead...then he meets Alice.
"When troubled twenty-one-year-old Seamus Blake meets the enigmatic Jimmy (just arrived in San Francisco by bicycle from his hometown in Buffalo, New York), he feels his life may finally be taking off. But the ensuing romance proves short-lived as Jimmy dies of an AIDS-related illness. The grieving Seamus is obliged to keep a promise: "Take me back the way I came," Jimmy had asked. And so Seamus sets out by bicycle on a picaresque journey with the ashes, hoping to bring them back to Buffalo. He meets truck drivers, waitresses, Native Americans, college kids, farmers, ranchers, and Marines--each one giving him a new perspective on his own life and on Jimmy's death. When he falls in man whose mother has also recently died, Seamus's grief and his story become universal and redemptive. Award-winning novelist Trebor Healey depicts San Francisco in the 1980s and '90s in poetic prose that is both ribald and poignant, and a crossing into the American West that is dreamy, mythic, mystifying."--Publisher's description.
In a monumental and important work for the Thoroughbred industry, author and pedigree researcher Avalyn Hunter provides extensive pedigree analysis of every American classic race winner from 1914 through 2002.
A rogue. An outlaw. An unlikely hero. Viking is the sole offspring of a savage and vicious mare. The colt is the pride of the stable until his dam kills a groom in her stall. Viking is a painful reminder of the tragedy, and so he is sold off. The black colt has a coarse face and a mean curl to his nostrils, but he is beautifully proportioned with magnificent gaits. With his teeth and thick weapon of a tail, Viking brutalizes everyone who handles him and humiliates the best trainers in the world until Anne O'Neil from the United States tries him. The first time she rides him, she declares that she will not buy him if he was the last apple in the barrel. The second time, she rides him with a different philosophy, as if he is as sensitive as one of her Thoroughbreds, and she is amazed by the results. Kindness and sugar turn out to be the keys to Viking's heart. Viking and Anne become rising stars until a cruel and brutal trainer seeks to crush his spirit. A Horse Named Viking follows the life journey of an incredible, unforgettable horse.
Alice has a nose for trouble, but luckily she's a fairy--a Temporary Fairy. She has a magic wand, fairy wings, and a blanket, all of which she uses to disappear, to fly, to transform her dad into a horse, and to turn his cookies into her own! There are still a few things Alice needs to learn to become a Permanent Fairy, like how to float her dog on the ceiling and make her clothes put themselves away, but she's working on it--sort of. Here's an endearing, funny story about a girl and her magical imagination, sure to delight every fairy in training!
Born in 1908, Paul Engle grew up the son of a livery stable keeper. As he writes in his dedication to this loving account, "I had a lucky life. Such a way will never be lived here again. It has gone with the wild buffalo skinners and the Indian fighters, with my mother's hands whose tough calluses tore the sheets as she made my bed, with that marvelous rich reek of harnesses and saddle leather, of horse manure and sweat which I happily breathed each day". The anecdotes are rich and captivating. As a boy Engle sold newspapers to factory workers at Quaker Oats and followed his route out to the city limits where coyotes howled in the woods. He helped his father break and train gaited saddle horses in all weathers and seasons. From family holidays with lively activities, uncles, aunts, and memorable foods to his job in the neighborhood drugstore dispensing castor oil, sodas, tonics, and linaments, Engle's absorbing stories capture the characters and atmosphere of American life just after the turn of the century.
“Brooks’ chronological and cross-disciplinary leaps are thrilling.” —The New York Times Book Review “Horse isn’t just an animal story—it’s a moving narrative about race and art.” —TIME “A thrilling story about humanity in all its ugliness and beauty . . . the evocative voices create a story so powerful, reading it feels like watching a neck-and-neck horse race, galloping to its conclusion—you just can’t look away.” —Oprah Daily Winner of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, the Dayton Literary Peace Prize, and the Dr. Tony Ryan Book Award · Finalist for the Chautauqua Prize · A Massachusetts Book Award Honor Book A discarded painting in a junk pile, a skeleton in an attic, and the greatest racehorse in American history: from these strands, a Pulitzer Prize winner braids a sweeping story of spirit, obsession, and injustice across American history Kentucky, 1850. An enslaved groom named Jarret and a bay foal forge a bond of understanding that will carry the horse to record-setting victories across the South. When the nation erupts in civil war, an itinerant young artist who has made his name on paintings of the racehorse takes up arms for the Union. On a perilous night, he reunites with the stallion and his groom, very far from the glamor of any racetrack. New York City, 1954. Martha Jackson, a gallery owner celebrated for taking risks on edgy contemporary painters, becomes obsessed with a nineteenth-century equestrian oil painting of mysterious provenance. Washington, DC, 2019. Jess, a Smithsonian scientist from Australia, and Theo, a Nigerian-American art historian, find themselves unexpectedly connected through their shared interest in the horse—one studying the stallion’s bones for clues to his power and endurance, the other uncovering the lost history of the unsung Black horsemen who were critical to his racing success. Based on the remarkable true story of the record-breaking thoroughbred Lexington, Horse is a novel of art and science, love and obsession, and our unfinished reckoning with racism.
Alice is the most rootin’, tootin’ cowgirl in all of Dallas . . . Pennsylvania. Each day she puts on her favorite boots and hat and sets off on her stick pony for school with a “Yippee ki-yay!” Alice is used to being the only cowgirl around, until Lexis from Texas arrives at school one day. Lexis seems to be a real cowgirl, with her fancy hat, jingling spurs, and lasso tricks. Alice decides there’s only one way to know who the best cowgirl is: a school-yard showdown at high noon! But will Alice learn there’s room for more than one cowgirl in town? Bestselling author and illustrator Marilyn Sadler and Ard Hoyt team up to create a rollicking tale of friendship that will have readers dancing the Texas Two-Step and shouting “Yee-haw,” no matter where they’re from. Praise for Alice from Dallas "The comic watercolor-and-ink illustrations don’t miss a beat in capturing the amusing rivalry that turns into friendship...The clever ending is a yee-haw moment that will rope in readers as quick as tumbling tumbleweeds." --Kirkus Reviews "Hoyt’s bright ink-and-watercolor illustrations gleefully capture the girls’ enthusiasm for all things western, from their fringed cowgirl blouses to the bandannas tied jauntily around their necks. A lively story for cowgirls everywhere, with a breezy lesson about jealousy." --Booklist Award: NAPPA Gold Award Winner
In her stunning debut, Kyle produces an emotionally powerful coming-of-age story that deftly and movingly captures not only the complexity of love, loss, and human relationships but also the fierce and powerful bond between horses and humans.
