Young girls and horses are a special duo. Like many young girls, I was enamored with horses when I was young. I was lucky enough to have a friend who had one. She let me muck stables and pick hooves to my heart's content. I rode nearly every summer while attending Girl Scout Camp, and when I was old enough, I became a camp counselor. I spent two summers leading trail rides and teaching younger girls all about horses.
Here are two books for girls who are as horse-crazy as I was. It's interesting (and completely coincidental!) that both involve cases of mistaken identity.
Here are two books for girls who are as horse-crazy as I was. It's interesting (and completely coincidental!) that both involve cases of mistaken identity.
Yee ha! Middle Grade Readers will love LuAnn M. Rod's Maddie McDowell and the Rodeo Robbery! (Chicken Scratch Books, June 2021)
After her mother's death, Maddie is sent to a strict school for young ladies. A lady Maddie is not. She's a cowgirl who wants to join the rodeo! Fortunately for her, she's mistaken for a rodeo star, and gets a chance to prove herself. Unfortunately, someone else riding with the rodeo is a thief. Maddie must gather her courage and her wits to solve the mystery, earn her own spot in the rodeo, and reconcile herself with her family.
Set right after the close of World War I, this book has few historical references, but the clothing, the technology and some of the customs firmly set it in its period. This book lopes along at a good pace. It has some fun characters that readers will really want to cheer for, including a pugnacious dog who always shows up and the right time. Maddie learns some valuable life lessons in this sweet and fun read.
After her mother's death, Maddie is sent to a strict school for young ladies. A lady Maddie is not. She's a cowgirl who wants to join the rodeo! Fortunately for her, she's mistaken for a rodeo star, and gets a chance to prove herself. Unfortunately, someone else riding with the rodeo is a thief. Maddie must gather her courage and her wits to solve the mystery, earn her own spot in the rodeo, and reconcile herself with her family.
Set right after the close of World War I, this book has few historical references, but the clothing, the technology and some of the customs firmly set it in its period. This book lopes along at a good pace. It has some fun characters that readers will really want to cheer for, including a pugnacious dog who always shows up and the right time. Maddie learns some valuable life lessons in this sweet and fun read.
Linda Wilson's Tall Boots is for a slightly younger reader. In it, Ashley is a beginning rider who wants to earn a blue ribbon at the 4-H show and convince her mother that she is serious enough about riding to deserve a pair of tall riding boots. When her too-big helmet slips over her face, Ashley is mistaken for someone else and ends up competing in a more experienced class of riders. Luckily for her, Lacy, her spunky Welsh Mountain pony, knows just what to do. This picture book is filled with colorful and sweet illustrations and includes information on how readers can join the 4-H.
Jennifer Bohnhoff was a middle school teacher for years. Now she's staying home to write and walk her enormous dog in the mountains outside her house. Her novel Code: Elephants on the Moon is also the story of a girl and her horse. Set in Normandy just prior to the D-Day Invasion, Eponine Lambaol and Galopin, her stocky Brittany, must avoid tangling with the Nazis that run her village as she helps the French Resistance and tries to come to grips with the secrets in her own past. This, too, is a middle grade book about a spunky girl with a mistaken identity.
