The Black Stallion Legend (Black Stallion Series)

Rating:
Summary: The Black Stallion Legend
Review: Farley took a chance with this book and, unlike others, it rocked my world. It took me a couple tries to finally understand what happened at the end of the book, and that is the only detraction I have! Alec's pain is raw and movingly depicted in this book. I didn't think Walter Farley had that kind of cathartic writing ability at all, but he really pulled it off. The reader can follow poor Alec through the pain of loss and then come to terms with it as he does. Farley did it! This book is a must read if you want to end the series right. Read it.

Rating:
Summary: OK I guess
Review: I had written Walter Farley before this book was released. He wrote me back and told me he was working on it. (I still have the letter.) This story was a difficult one for Mr. Farley to write, as the character of Pam was modelled after his own daughter Pam who was killed in a car crash in Europe in the late 1960's. It is a harsh awakening for Alec, who loses his love; the one bright spot in his darkening world. Business pressures, the physical strain on his body, and the need to take a break from horse racing were all taking their toll on Alec. With the death of Pam, Alec's world collapsed, and he headed west. Just when things seemed like they couldn't get worse, a meteor strikes the earth. What should have been a calamatous event becomes a new beginning for Alec,Henry,the Black, and Hopeful Farm. I found the book interesting, although not as good as THE BLACK STALLION AND THE GIRL, the one Black Stallion book that has overshadowed all others,in my opinion.

Rating:
Summary: Good beginning, terrible ending. . .
Review: I've read all the books in the Black Stallion series, and this is the one I happen to like the least. The Black Stallion legend started out OK, but it turned out to be a very depressing, and eventually unnerving book, especially since it was the last one in the series. The preceding book, The Black Stallion and the Girl, was wonderful. Alec and a girl named Pam meet and fall in love, and the book ends on a hopeful note that Pam will someday return to Hopeful farm and marry Alec when she feels that the timing is right. But in this book, Pam gets killed in a car accident in Europe, and Alec has a nervous breakdown from his grief and the stress of the racing business. As a result, he simply ends up taking off across the country with the Black.
The second half of this book reads more like something out of the "Left Behind" series than one of Farley's books, with planet-wide earthquakes and meteor strikes. And the ending wasn't very clear - it left the reader puzzled and bewildered instead of a definite, tidy ending. Alec was on the phone with Henry, telling him where he is and that he and the Black are fine. When Alec feels an earthquake tremor, he asks if Henry is still there and there's no answer. And that's how it all ends. I think Farley should have left a good thing alone with the Black Stallion and the Girl, and not finished off a wonderful series with such a depressing tale.

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Summary: Another bizarre weird plotline.
Review: Massive earthquakes rock the world and wreak destruction while fulfilling a Native American prophecy. Sounds like the plot from a bad movie, right? Actually it is the plot of Farley's 20th book in the Black Stallion series. After Pam's death, Alec flees with the Black west to Arizonia where a Native American tribe claims that he and his black horse are the sign that they have been looking for that the end of the world is near. This is probably the most bizarre book in the series. Besides being completely improbable, it never resolves Alec's feelings over the death of Pam. Instead it just throws him into another disaster that seem to characterize most of Farley's plot lines.

Rating:
Summary: The Black Stallion Legend
Review: The story takes place in the desert with a boy named Alec Ramsey and his Black Stallion, but he called it "Black". They were wandering in the desert one day and they heard an amazing story from an indian. The end of the world was coming, he said, but an ancient legend had promised that the only way from preventing this to happen was if the Black Stallion would help with a rider on his back. The indian told Alec that the horse he was talking about was his. Alec just ignored it and walked away. All of a sudden somthing had struck from the sky! The whole tribe of indians was in Alecs hands,leaving the Black Stallion with a challange bigger than any race!

Rating:
Summary: The Black Stallion Legend
Review: This book is really the last of the series, because the Young Black Stallion is kind of like a prequel. Along with The Black Stallion's Ghost, Mystery (my personal fave) and The Young Black Stallion, this book was one of the "weird" ones. (I have heard about the Island Stallion Races being odd too, but I have just ordered that one off Ebay and haven't read it yet. I had the series as a kid and got rid of them and just recently had to buy them all back. haha). The story kind of has nothing to do with horse racing and the fairy tale story that the series started off with. No, Farley's writing style changed a LOT at the end of the series, and this book was really odd. It freaked me out when I read it at the age of 13, and now I am 19 and find it hard to beleive that this book, along with Ghost, Mystery, and Young, was meant for children ages 9-12... it is apocolyptic, confusing, depressing, and gets under your skin. At times, even drug-induced. I wonder why Farley made the book end so horribly?