Actually good horse books?

[Janeway]

@clint

Draftmare, I don’t know if they have been mentioned but Robin McKinley’s books The Hero and the Crown and The Blue Sword are both wonderful fantasy fiction books with horses very much involved. I loved both of them. (They may have been mentioned early on in this thread.)

Those are two of my favourite books of all time! Have re-read both more than once. Have never read anything else by McKinley though.

I second the Dressage Chronicles - just finished them and loved them all! My new favourite horse books are Mary Pagone’s eventing series following her character Simon O’Shaughnessy. Love them :love-struck:

Currently reading “Hunter Derby” by Kim Ablon Whitney. Also love the Ambition eventing series about Jules by Natalie Reinert Keller. Very realistic.

[Impractical_Horsewoman]

Aw, thank you so much @Janeway on behalf of Simon! I’m almost done with the first draft of book five in the series, Give and Hazard All!

I’ll second the recommendation of Kim’s and Natalie’s books as well. Kate Lattey also has a wonderful series called Pony Jumpers set in her native New Zealand. Self-publishing has really opened up the door for lots of authors who might otherwise have struggled to convince a publisher that a realistic horse book was marketable!

[Draftmare]

@Janeway

Those are two of my favourite books of all time! Have re-read both more than once. Have never read anything else by McKinley though.

I second the Dressage Chronicles - just finished them and loved them all! My new favourite horse books are Mary Pagone’s eventing series following her character Simon O’Shaughnessy. Love them :love-struck:

Currently reading “Hunter Derby” by Kim Ablon Whitney. Also love the Ambition eventing series about Jules by Natalie Reinert Keller. Very realistic.

I’ve seen a couple of series on Amazon that look similar to Dressahe Chronicles, but about different events, and have wondered if any of them are any good. I know there is one about show jumping, the hunters, and eventing.

[16_Hands]

@Kirby's Keeper

Any of the Jilly Cooper novels. Riders, Polo, Jump, etc are great summer reading. I do hope she does a dressage novel next

I hated that book “Riders” The heroine(?) was such an ass I wanted to smack her. Not to mention her so-called boyfriend who abused his horses. I ended up giving it away to someone on here.

[16_Hands]

@Sandy M

Oh, I’m sorry. I HATE those Gruen books. Foolishly read the second after I heartily disliked the first. Obnoxious characters and the horse “knowledge” is akin to fantasy. Yeah, kid gets on “difficult” (only she can handle it!!!) Nokota horse and shortly (in a few minutes) is doing passage and piaffe, then events him - intimated to be advanced- and makes an error, then within a short period, he’s an open jumper…eh…NO.

I know! I only read Flying changes and it was so unreal. Okay, so girl has this horse and goes to live on a farm. Famous trainer lives nearby or something and takes girl under wing. After seeing horse jump a pasture fence, she enters horse in an event at Prelim level. Event is only two weeks away. It hits all the numbers for a trifecta of someone with no horse knowledge - No formal training on horse for over fences or dressage but is deemed to be a superstar in the eventing world, girl has no formal training herself, Horse and rider entered in a prelim level event with no training and just two weeks away like it’s some local schooling show and you can just enter whenever you want.

[hb]

@Impractical Horsewoman

Aw, thank you so much @Janeway on behalf of Simon! I’m almost done with the first draft of book five in the series, Give and Hazard All!

I’ll second the recommendation of Kim’s and Natalie’s books as well. Kate Lattey also has a wonderful series called Pony Jumpers set in her native New Zealand. Self-publishing has really opened up the door for lots of authors who might otherwise have struggled to convince a publisher that a realistic horse book was marketable!

I love Kate Lattey’s books. The description of the riding is very accurate, and the characters are all real, with good and bad qualities. And sometimes the heroine of the novel does well in a show but doesn’t come in first…