Dark Horses and Black Beauties: Animals, Women, a Passion

Rating:
Summary: Take the good with the bad
Review: A horse owner and lover, I was given this book as a gift. Had it not been a gift I would have happily thrown it in the trash, but I kept reading in order to give the soon-to-be-asked-for book review. This book is dark, very dark. There are a few nice "moments." I kept waiting for the "payoff" for all the darkness and it never came. Overall I found it disturbing and wanted only to expunge it from my memory. There are other books that will be much more enlightening and enjoyable. Buy those.

Rating:
Summary: What I said to friends on the Chronicle of the Horse forums
Review: Dark Horses and Black Beauties was a greatly moving book. It can teach not only horse enthusiasts but also people who don't know much about the equine. It was very strong and moving and the author didn't beat around the bush with what she was trying to get across. She adressed many of the major issues that are being dealt with in the equine world. She also went out and persued a personal insite in the horse world and didn't base her book off of strict facts. A GREAT book! Couldn't keep my nose out of it. I definitely recomend for anyone!

Rating:
Summary: A Voice for Horses
Review: I have read this book several times, when it was first published and again recently. This book is more than a feel good read about the relationship between women and horses. And it's also more than just an animal rights platform. From this book, I've re-established many of my earlier convictions about horses and developed new ones. As a former competitive rider who has been involved in Western performance events and recently taken up dressage, I've taken a hard look at myself and just exactly what I want to accomplish with a life blessed with horses. This book will help anyone figure out the same for themselves. A person who doesn't want to make any changes in the way their horses fit into their life will likely resent the author. But it can be a great inspiring journey for those who choose to take it. For the benefit of the horse and all other creatures, I hope this book reaches as many people as possible. As a last note, the controversial marketing of this book didn't bother this conservative republican non-vegetarian reader one bit.

Rating:
Summary: A Voice for Horses
Review: I have read this book several times, when it was first published and again recently. This book is more than a feel good read about the relationship between women and horses. And it's also more than just an animal rights platform. From this book, I've re-established many of my earlier convictions about horses and developed new ones. As a former competitive rider who has been involved in Western performance events and recently taken up dressage, I've taken a hard look at myself and just exactly what I want to accomplish with a life blessed with horses. This book will help anyone figure out the same for themselves. A person who doesn't want to make any changes in the way their horses fit into their life will likely resent the author. But it can be a great inspiring journey for those who choose to take it. For the benefit of the horse and all other creatures, I hope this book reaches as many people as possible. As a last note, the controversial marketing of this book didn't bother this conservative republican non-vegetarian reader one bit.

Rating:
Summary: I was irritated by this book, misled by its cover
Review: I thought I was getting a nostalgic look at a brief period in my childhood, as a privileged fourth grader taking riding lessons in tony, horsey Wilton CT. My horsey passion was cut short by an abrupt move to NYC, but I never forgot the elite culture I left behind. This small book started off OK with an accurate look at girl's formulaic horse stories, for which I award it a single star; I did get a few laughs. But it soon falls apart. I had not bargained for an animal rights book. I have a lot of bones to pick with Ms Pierson, but we'll settle for one here. I was annoyed by her self righteous dismissal of foxhunting, and thought she was unfair to the English hunt club that rescinded her invitation to ride with them after reading some of her more strident columns in the animal rights vein. Animal extremists in England are threatening the very existence of foxhunting, out of class envy and misplaced sentimentality; the foxhunters have every reason to be wary of unsympathetic journalists. Who is Ms Pierson to judge someone an impostor, in this case the hunt club official who turned her away, because they don't love horses according to her skewed definition of "love"? This annoyed me, especially because foxhunting was an important facet of our little coterie of girlish horse-lovers in the sixties. Fox hunters were widely accepted and venerated by us horse-loving girls who dreamed of riding to hounds on beautiful hunters. Ms. Pierson should have stuck to her theme, even if it made her uncomfortable. Besides, Marguerite Henry, a children's horsey book writer much admired by Ms Pierson, wrote "Cinnabar the One o'clock Fox" in which foxhunters were not typecast as cruel and stupid, but given their due as an important part of horse culture. I was too vexed to finish the final third of "Dark Horses", and was particularly annoyed because it started off so great!

Rating:
Summary: Glad I read it,but...
Review: I was given the book as a gift following the death of a dearly loved horse who had been part of my life for many years. I dug into it immediately, looking for some relief from my grief. While I could very much relate to her early obsession with horses, and since she is close to my age and from my part of the country, much of it felt like reading my own diary.

However, I felt that some of her points verged on rambling. I consider myself a literate, fairly well read individual, but found that I had to reread passages once or twice to try to distill her point. Parts of the book felt like walking through deep mud in heavy boots. Fortunately, every now and then she would provide a high and dry spot to rest and clean up.

Still I would recommend the book, for some of the important bold messages it does contain. Her obviously heartfelt concern for the welfare of the animal is refreshing. I am sorry to say that probably anyone who would be interested in reading the book probably already shares her concern, and once again has to be tortured by the images of the abuses we are painfully aware of and doing what we can to correct.

Rating:
Summary: What I said to friends on the Chronicle of the Horse forums
Review: It is a little book, one that describes the love from childhood of all things horse related and how a person grows but doesn't lose that feeling of awe and delight in the presence of horses. The author quotes brief remembrances of others who have had these incredible animals touch their lives.

While it focuses on little girls, women and gender, it is of definate interest to everyone here who loves horses. The author tries to explain why so few males continue to ride and lauds those who do.

I got halfway through the book and had to call ..... By that time, I had already cried twice and been astonished to find chapters dealing with COTH BB topics just in the past few days. ... topic on the Rich/Poor gap, Dressage vs Hunt Seat, "Natural Horsemanship vs Plain Common Sense, the desire for custom boots, doeskin britches, jeweled stock pins.

I was reminded of our dear ... and her bright and down to earth "Stupid Question of the Week" several times as the author describes her return to the horse dreams of childhood by taking up lessons after a 25 year hiatus.

After I got off the telephone with ..., the book turned even more towards the topics we are all obviously interested in. Slaughter, abuse, unwanted horses. She revisited her childhood anger over the plight of mustangs and the terrible treatment of livestock shipped for profit as opposed to our treasured pets and companions, first discovered through Marguerite Henry's book "Mustang, Wild Spirit of the West".

I was dumbfounded to read of Dr. Temple Grandin, a short few hours from the first time I had ever come across her work (in researching ... COTH Slaughter article topic). Totally surprised to not only find this information on the internet, then to have ... mention it later in the day, yet again in a book I had randomly selected!

This book, as I told ..., is really the inner core of many of us. I thought to call her back later to let her know that it is far more complex than I had led her to believe and not all happy memories.

Definately an intriguing book, perhaps not for everyone as it tells a grim tale of the treatment of horses in our society without rose colored glasses.

Rating:
Summary: Take the good with the bad
Review: While perusing the horse section at my local Borders, it was refreshing to come across a "different" kind of horse book. Here was not a book that would teach me how to ride or care for my horse, but rather enlighten me to the aspects of just why I am the horsey girl I am (although a grown woman these days).

I was sucked in with the first few pages, so I took this book home. Through most of the first third to half of the book, I couldn't believe that someone out there had hit the nail on the head so many times -- the author almostly perfectly described (in my opinion) the forlorn love of the little horse-crazed girl, particularly the kind that can't have one. Like one of the other reviewers, I too was hoping for a trip down nostalgia lane.

However, in comparison to the author, I am a woman that was fortunate to achieve my dream. I have had three horses in my lifetime so far, and I actively compete and live the dream I always had. I believe that the many years this author spent not realizing her dream helped fuel a resentment within her. Not to mention her animal activist views she proceeds to share with the reader in a writing style that suggests that the longer and more poetic the sounding sentence, the more spiritual it will be.

Like many other reviewers, I found the book to be misleading in its intentions, and I don't believe the author quite understands the kind of love that those of us who ride our horses have. I have met her kind before, the type that believe we are disrespecting and abusing horses by riding them for our own pleasure. I know there are all types of horse owners out there, and that all types of abuses are out there, but I'm not one of those types of owners and therefore the darkness of this book's true underlying message saddens me when it's not insulting me.

I'm curious to speculate what this author's views would have been had she gone on to become a loving, doting horse owner earlier in life.

Overall, I'm glad I bought this book. I'm glad I read this book, and for a lot of reasons enjoyed the experience of reading it regardless of the overall feeling it left me with. I would recommend others to just expect to take the good with the bad on this one.