Meet Christine Meunier

by Linda Benson

Christine is a young horsewoman from Australia. She's already had a varied and broad career with horses, as well as authoring (for now) three books about them. She also has a wonderful website called EQUUS http://equus-blog.com/ where she not only highlights careers with horses, but does horse book reviews and blogs about horse-related information in general. So much talent and diversity, and I'm  happy to share with you her books (below.) But first, in Christine's own words, please read how a very close call with a horse almost caused her to lose everything. She is, indeed, a survivor.

One of my most favourite things to do with my time is writing.  One of my favourite topics to write about is horses.  I’ve been blessed so far with an interesting and varied career with horses and have found that being able to write about what I’ve done, seen and dreamt of doing has formed into stories to inform others.

This is how my debut novel Horse Country was formed and finally released (after over 10 years of writing!) in July of 2013.

More recently, it has been my pleasure to create a horse series for pre-teens and release the first two in this series this month!  The Free Rein series focuses on three 10 year old girls who are horse crazy, but don’t yet have their own horses.  As well as exploring horse care and learning to horse ride, it looks at the Christian faith.

Over my horse career I have been blessed to work with racehorses, stud horses, riding school horses and trail and endurance horses.  My travels with horses have been interstate in Australia, over to Ireland and France and then on to South Africa.  These opportunities to travel and learn about many different breeds and disciplines have helped me to further create realistic situations that arise with people learning about horses.

In July of 2012 I experienced something unusual whilst working with racehorses in my local town.  I went to work at 5.30 on a Saturday morning at by 7.30 that same morning, my husband received a call that he needed to come to the hospital.  I had been kicked in the head by a horse and was unconscious.  I was then induced in a coma, flown a few hours away to a hospital in Melbourne and in a coma for the next four days.

This experience is one that I am still recovering from – my memory isn’t as good as it should be, and my stamina to work for extended periods of time (even a full day’s work) aren’t yet back to what they were prior to my accident.  This accident has shown me how much I still adore horses, working with them and writing about them.

Although it has been a setback for my career, it has provided me time and opportunity to invest in writing about this incredible animal.  For this, I am extremely grateful.  Horse Country was able to be finished and published because I had a lot of time on my hands, and the Free Rein series has formed also because of extra hours that I find cannot yet be utilised for my normal 9 – 5 job of teaching horse studies.

It is my hope that through each of my stories, people will read, learn and be inspired to pursue a career – a life! – with horses.

 

 

If you’re interested in the Free Rein series, check out http://www.freereinseries.com/ and http://www.facebook.com/FreeReinSeries

 

Horse Country follows the lives of four women working in the horse industry and can be found at http://www.horsecountrybook.com/ and http://www.facebook.com/HorseCountryBook

Thank you so much for stopping by the blog, Christine, and we are very glad that your close call turned out okay. Best of luck with your writing and publishing career, and of course, with all your horse activities in the future!

They Called Her Flipper

Posted by Linda Benson

Many of you enjoyed one of our recent guest posts about near-wrecks on horseback, written by Maureen Gaffney. Here is the link, in case you missed it: http://equestrianink.blogspot.com/2013/01/guest-post-from-maureen-gaffney.html

Today, Maureen shares another story from her experiences as an assistant trainer at an Arabian ranch. Please enjoy the ride, and hang on to your seats (or in this case, perhaps not!)

 While working at one of the large Arabian show farms in Santa Ynez, I was told to ride a smallish gray mare that was in the charge of the new trainer, who happened to be on her way to a horse show.  Something in the way she had said "....if you want....." and then almost imperceptibly grimaced as she drove out the driveway with a 6-horse trailer full of well-mannered, sweet and responsive mounts made several important hairs stand up on the back of my neck.  I should have listened to those hairs.

 

The head trainer—my boss—did not attend the show and we were riding together in the arena, me on the smallish gray and he on an elegant bay the likes of which I aspired to ride someday.  All was going well, just warming up after a decent but not devastating lounging—the mare had broken a sweat but no oxygen mask was likely to drop in front of her due to a loss in cabin pressure. 

 

I swung a leg over and settled into the postage-stamp sized English flat saddle (I would later thank 'lucky stars' it was not a western saddle with a menacing horn) and we tooled around the ring for a bit on a loose rein extended walk.  I gathered her up a tad and stopped to talk to the boss about this or that.  As we stood on our respective mounts chatting, the gray mare began to bob her head up and down rhythmically as if controlled by some unseen marionette conductor.  Unbeknownst to me, this bobbing was in preparation for something larger. 

 

Now, generally speaking, horses do not like to up-end.  If you've had the great pleasure of watching a days-old foal on its first full twisting, cavorting gallop in a large pasture, you've likely also seen the youngster bite the dust and with a great comic flourish, get up, shake off, and immediately look this way and that to see if the humiliating encounter with gravity has been witnessed by man, beast, insect or vegetable.  Like humans, horses become rather embarrassed when they fall down. 

 

Seems small gray mare missed this vital part of her "Horse 101--General Decorum" class.  While I sat upon her strong, short back, she nearly audibly counted "A-One, and-a-Two, and-a-three, and-a-Four" with each head-bob before she threw herself up and over backwards from a standstill, and with a flirty swish of her tail, slammed us both into the ground with great aplomb. I lay there stunned with an 800 pound animal resting calmly on my right knee and thigh, trying to ascertain if I am headed for the hospital or if I’ll just be bruised.  The utterly confounded boss says from his perch on high "What the..??  Get her off of you!!!" to which I respond "Uh, yeah...." like, gee man, that's a pretty neat idea—wish I had thought of it. 

 

She lingered a bit longer on my leg, then decided the jig was up and returned to that boring ol' standing position.  Having taken the first opportunity to put some daylight between the two of us, I was no longer astride by the time she was upright. 

 

Me, the boss, and the bosses’ horse just looked at her with incredulous and deeply offended expressions, like "What sort of a thing ARE you?"  She had, after all, just cast shame on her species by displaying her willingness to forego her noble ancestry and grovel like swine all in the name of…what? Revenge? Just plain march-hare variety madness?  I don’t know, but I put her back in her stall and gave warm thanks to the rest of the kind-hearted horses I rode that day.  The bosses’ horse who witnessed those strange events ever after gave her a curiously wide berth.

 

 

Starting as a groom and working up to assistant trainer, Maureen Gaffney worked at West Coast Arabians for 8 years, then moved on to work for some of the best performance trainers in Santa Ynez and Texas before ending up back in Northern California.  Horses supported Maureen through college in Santa Barbara and at UC Berkeley.  Maureen has since hung up her spurs and is now a desk jockey working to plan and implement a long-distance trail around the San Francisco Bay.  She enjoys writing, riding (mostly bicycles these days), cooking, wine and friends.  Maureen has been published in Horse Illustrated, American Trails Magazine, and Dirt Rag (a mountain bike magazine).  She lives in Larkspur, California with her favorite man.   

Thanks so much for sharing another of your experiences, Maureen, and glad that you survived in one piece!

Readers - have you had experiences with horses that reared, and then flipped over, while someone was riding them? How did you handle this very dangerous situation?

Guest Post from Maureen Gaffney

It's interesting, isn't it, how some of our most memorable moments in this sport are wrecks that we barely survive, horses that are bad actors, or moments that really set our hearts racing? (And not in a good way.) Please enjoy this guest post from one of our readers, Maureen Gaffney, as she recalls one such incident. But first, a little about Maureen:

Maureen was born in Sebastopol, California, about an hour north of San Francisco.  As her family could not afford to own horses, she found a nearby stable willing to let her work for free.

This small Arabian horse farm was then purchased by new owners who dramatically expanded the facility and it soon became one of the top Arabian show barns in the country.  Starting as a groom and working up to assistant trainer, Maureen worked at West Coast Arabians for 8 years, then moved on to work for some of the best performance trainers in Santa Ynez and Texas before ending up back in Northern California. Horses supported Maureen through college in Santa Barbara and at UC Berkeley.

 

Eulipia

By Maureen Gaffney

While working at Paragon Arabians in Santa Ynez, California as an assistant trainer (this is code for ‘sacrificial rider’), we took in two horses from a new client.  They were brother and sister, both by the notoriously hot (and a touch psycho) sire, *Gdansk.  I had learned to be a little wary of the owner who brought in a young horse and cheerily proclaimed “Oh yes, she’s broke”.  Sometimes they were. Sometimes mom and dad had an interesting interpretation of “broke”.  It was time for me to find out on which side of the line “Eulipia” fell.

I grabbed the requisite fistful of strawberry and gray colored mane with my left hand, reins short enough for light contact with her mouth, and placed my foot in the awaiting stirrup.  For the previously mentioned reasons, this one made me nervous.  With one last full in-and-exhale, I checked her eye to make sure we were still on the same planet, and having been given the proverbial green light, I pushed off.  Somewhere during those yawning, eternal 4 seconds before I was firmly ensconced in the saddle, the light in her eye flashed red! red! red! and with my leg at approximately mid-arc over her back, the three-year-old filly with the hot bloodline lost her ever-loving mind.

She bolted--first up--then forward like a sleek hide-and-hair covered cannon ball.  Having not yet attained a sitting position much less the second stirrup, I was hurtled onto her neck which only served to further her profound and deepening pool of panic.  My attempts at soothing words were hampered not only by the imminence of my impending fall--only the severity of which was now in question--but by the copious amounts of her long silvery hair winding through my molars.  My soft-toned pleas of "It's okay honey" she heard as "run for the bay like a bunny" and so we lurched around the arena via the most tenuous of connections for a few more adrenaline-laced moments before she unceremoniously threw me over her head where I landed with a thud in a mushroom cloud of dirt. 

Generally speaking, horses--Arabians in particular--do not like to step on foreign objects in their path of travel.  In fact, they will go to great ridiculous lengths to avoid even a discolored patch of dirt.  A horse that you have finally decided is physically incapable of performing a simple cross-over move will suddenly embark on a 40+ mph supersonic side pass if a shadow or stray bit of hay interrupts his route.  For this reason, I was greatly surprised to find the filly placing not one, not two, but three hooves into the small, middle and upper levels of my back. I lay there for some time trying to decide if I was broken.  She gingerly approached me, reins and mane all asunder with that "So....um, hey--whatcha' doin' down there?" look on her face. 

I was not broken, nor--apparently--was she.  She persevered and menaced me further, but via a clever combination of a near starvation diet*, exhaustive pre-ride exercising, and an inventive program called "let the groom ride her", she never managed to unload me again. 

*not really.

Maureen has since hung up her spurs and is now a desk jockey working to plan and implement a long-distance trail around the San Francisco Bay.  She enjoys writing, riding (mostly bicycles these days), cooking, wine and friends.  Maureen has been published in Horse Illustrated, American Trails Magazine, and Dirt Rag (a mountain bike magazine).  She lives in Larkspur, California with her favorite man.    

Thank you so much for stopping by, Maureen, and sharing your story of one of those "memorable" horses. I'm sure many of us can relate, and glad that you survived to tell the tale!

Different Muscles for Different Folks

by Maggie Dana

Ever since Linda Benson invited me to write a guest post I’ve been tumbling from one idea to another like sneakers in a dryer. Should I blather on about how choosing shoes is like choosing your book’s cover, share my thoughts on how book design affects readability, or explain how and why I began writing? Then I read Linda’s riveting account of her 1985 Tevis Cup ride and a bunch of flashbulbs went off. Finally, I had my article.

And it’s all about muscles—riding muscles and writing muscles.

Back when I was still married (in the Jurassic Era), my then-husband and I rode into the Grand Canyon. We’d just endured a 64-mile drive over rocky dirt roads to reach the rim by 8 a.m. where our guide, an intrepid Havasupai Indian, was waiting with ten ornery looking horses that had been on the job since dawn. They’d already climbed the eight miles up from their village; they didn’t look too keen about going back down again.

My husband was a fighter pilot. He didn’t know one end of a horse from the other, and I had only ever ridden in English saddles. This would be my first time riding Western. There were three others besides my husband and me. We were told to mount up, and I guess it was pretty obvious I was the only one who knew how to ride because the guide told me to take the lead; he would catch up with us when the rest of his customers arrived.

“Where do I go?” I said.

He pointed. “Over there.”

Unfortunately, ‘over there’ was a panorama of blue sky anchored by the canyon’s south rim. Did the guide want me to leap into outer space? I edged my reluctant horse closer to the edge. Shale and loose rocks tumbled down the terrifying drop-off where a narrow trail gave a whole new meaning to the word ‘hairpin.’ For someone used to riding in a dressage arena or through the gentle English countryside, this was mind-numbingly scary. Up to that point, the scariest thing I’d ever done on a horse was jump a three-foot fence bareback when I was a whole lot younger.

I had a feeling this little venture was going to be a whole lot scarier.

My husband, who was much better with dizzying heights than I was, suggested we’d better get going, so I shoved my feet into a pair of unforgiving wooden stirrups and took the plunge. Down we went, scrambling for footing. Then came the first corner and my horse changed his mind. He whirled around, stumbled, and teetered on the brink of destruction. My world tilted sideways. Breathtaking scenery rushed by, but I was too busy trying to stay in the saddle to pay attention. Finally, my horse found his feet. We got ourselves sorted, but I wanted to go right back to the top and stay there. Sadly, that was no longer an option. There were nine other horses blocking my way. So down we continued, descending fast enough to make my head spin.

Four wearying hours later, we arrived in the Havasupai village only to learn that if we wanted to see the spectacular waterfalls (the reason for this arduous journey) we would have to ride another two miles.

So we did, and the falls were, indeed, spectacular. I wanted to jump in, fully dressed, to soothe my sore muscles. I wanted to join the other joyful swimmers in the blue-green water that foamed and cascaded over rocks the color of terracotta plant pots.

But no. We couldn’t stay. For some inexplicable reason our guide insisted we had to get back to the village.

And when I finally got off my horse, I no longer had ankles that worked. I landed in an unseemly heap on the ground. Given I hadn’t ridden in a few years, I fully expected my legs (inner thighs, especially) to be screaming for mercy, but I didn’t expect my feet and ankles to give out as well. I blame those malevolent wooden stirrups. They forced my outward-turning feet into a straight line and kept them there for the best part of a day. These particular muscles had never been abused like this before, and boy, did they complain.

After a restless night beneath a scratchy blanket on a canvas cot in the village’s one-room hotel, it was time to mount up for the ride back out. I did NOT want to get on that horse. I seriously doubted my ankles would survive the journey. I actually envied those who were walking out (yes, I was that demented), then told my husband I wanted a helicopter ride to the rim. He looked at the cloudless blue sky, scrunched up his pilot’s eyes, and said, “No helicopter will be landing here today.”

He was right. It had to do with something incomprehensible about thermals and clear air turbulence.

So we rode out and my ankles have yet to forgive me. But this really brought home to me the difference between Western and English stirrups and how they can cause unexpected trauma when it comes to muscles, especially those we rarely think about and take for granted.

It’s the same with writing.

The muscles we use for writing full-length fiction are different from the muscles required for writing short stories. Think about it. A novel is like a marathon; a short story is a sprint. Usain Bolt is an Olympic gold medalist, but he could never win a 26-mile race.

Several years ago, one of my favorite British authors wrote a short story that appeared in a popular women’s magazine. The story wandered. It had no beginning, no middle, and no discernible end. It sort of fizzled out. Luckily, this didn’t put me off her books. I still buy them, sight unseen, because she’s a brilliant novelist.

Then again, there’s Frederick Forsyth, best-selling author of novels such as The Odessa File, The Fist of God, and The Afghan, who also wrote No Comebacks, a series of brilliant short stories that’s being reissued as an e-book, along with a novella, The Shepherd. He’s a multi-talented author who pulls off all genres with success, and I bet he has no trouble with English or Western stirrups, either.

[Author’s note: Linda has re-educated me about Western tack. It no longer savages your ankles, and because of this, I might be encouraged to try it again. If nothing else, I am now old enough to appreciate a pommel you can hang onto.]

Thanks so much for sharing that great adventure, Maggie! I hope your next experience with Western riding turns out better.Yes, a good, broke-in saddle won't hurt your ankles, and there is always that horn. LOL

To learn more about Maggie Dana and her great fiction for young horse lovers, called the Timber Ridge Riders series, or her hilarious, heart-warming (and a little bit steamy) women's fiction, visit her website right here:

http://www.maggiedana.com or find her on Facebook.

Thanks for stopping by, Maggie!

Meet Angelia Almos

Today we have a guest post from one of our regular readers - Angelia Almos. She formed a lifelong passion for horses at the age of five when she talked her parents into riding lessons. Horses often play a prominent role in her young adult fantasy books. She also write horsey nonfiction and space opera. She lives in the Sierra Nevada Mountains with her husband, two daughters, two dogs, two cats, and one pony (she often thinks of bumping that number up to two).

Angelia has a brand new book out called Unicorn Keep, and it's billed as young adult fantasy.

 To learn more about it, you can visit her website: www.angeliaalmos.com

 

Horsey Characters
by Angelia Almos
 
One of the cool things about writing young adult fantasy and horsey fiction is getting to put some of my beloved horses into the stories I’m telling.

My first young adult fantasy, Horse Charmer, featured my show horse from my teenage years. Kristy and I probably had the strongest relationship and bond out of all of the horses who have been a part of my life. I changed her name for the book, but the way she looked and behaved was exactly how I would have imagined Kristy if she could talk as Kali in Horse Charmer can.

My upcoming romantic suspense novel under my Angie Derek pen name will feature a cameo from the very first horse I took lessons on when I was five years old. Old Ben snuck into the book without me consciously choosing for him to be there, but once I remembered I had named him the same as that gentle bay gelding who started me on my path of horsiness, I knew the name was perfect. Made me want to give him a bigger part in the book.

When I came up with the idea for Unicorn Keep, I wanted to include another one of the many horses who had touched my life. Ginger, my family’s Shetland pony, had to be put down earlier in the year. She had been a part of my life off and on since I was fourteen years old, and we later purchased her for my own daughter. After her passing, she was in my thoughts a lot so it only seemed natural to put a spunky and sassy pony into Unicorn Keep. She kept her name, but I made Ginger larger than her true ten hands since my heroine was a teenager and needed to ride her through most of the book. Ginger got to shoot up two hands to the average Welsh pony height which I think she would have liked. Ginger’s personality was always bigger than her size.

Some of my favorite horse books growing up were the ones where the horses were just as much a main character as the hero/heroine. Battlecry in Battlecry Forever and Flame in the Island Stallion series come to mind when I think of a horse as being a major character. But horse stars aren’t limited to the printed page. The Black was popular enough to have two movies and a TV show made about him. Maximus from Tangled is probably one of the funniest horses on screen. I could go on and on naming horse after horse, but I’ll stop there.

Who are some of your favorite horse characters in print and on screen?

Meet Nancy Di Fabbio

Today we have a guest blog from Nancy Di Fabbio - a horsewoman who didn't get to satisfy her passion for horses until later in life, but who now owns four of them.



She also has a new book out called Midnight Magic - Be Careful What You Wish For - which is a spooky thriller about a haunted painting, a mysterious Morgan stallion and the girl that loves him.





Please enjoy this tongue-in-cheek blog post about Nancy's purchase of a very green horse, and their first horse show together (which she actually lived through.)

WHY DO WE DO THIS TO OURSELVES? 

 As a 42-year-old rookie, I met Trinity and was immediately enchanted by his beauty, diminutive stature and fun-loving personality. He was a four-year-old Morgan with a pinch of Arab, as green as a prized emerald, and had more energy than a nuclear reactor but he sure was cute.

I bought him on the spot, and even though all the professionals thought he was my ticket to the hereafter, I loved him and gleefully sped around the ring on him at warp speed. When I finally sucked up enough courage to participate in my first horse show, I chose him to be my partner, even though I already owned two tried-and-trued show horses.

My best friend, Georgina, who was also a late-bloomer, accompanied me to a local 4-H show. While she sauntered off to sign me up for my pleasure classes, I asked a nearby horsewoman to help me unload The Meenster. (Yes, his name is Trinity, but he earned this nick-name, short for "mini-monster.") As I let down the ramp, puffed up with pride, I told her that this was my first horse show. (I was 45.) "Good for you!" she said - until Trinity blasted out of the trailer like a rocket off the launch pad.

She blanched and asked, "Ummm - does he lunge?"

Completely at ease with my little maniac, I replied, "Yes, but he'll be fine under tack. Lunging will only rev him um." Cringing, she slunk away - probably to alert the EMT's.

When my friend returned, even she looked a bit wan as she witnessed him in full stallion mode. (He's actually a gelding, but nobody has ever convinced him of this sorry fact.) I knew he was no pleasure horse, but I had chosen this class because it was held in a huge field, not a ring. I knew he was going to be booking, and I wanted room to avoid the other competitors. I entered the field and slowly walked him around as the other riders trotted, cantered, or galloped by. I learned long ago that you can't wear him out; it's better to keep him calm, allow him to scope out the area and prepare himself for what is to come.

As soon as the twenty-five competitors entered the field, (yes, 25!) the judge's voice blared, "Walk, all riders, please walk."

Admittedly, I was a nervous wreck, but The Meenster performed perfectly at the walk and trot; the canter was a completely different story. The thundering of one hundred hooves awoke the wild beast within the horsey beast, and soon we were flying past Thoroughbreds and Quarter horses like they were standing still. My poor friend, who was watching from the sidelines, looked like she'd just eaten a bucket of bad clams, as riders flew off their mounts like popcorn kernels on a hot griddle.

When they mercifully called for the walk, The Meenster immediately responded and we lined up in the center of the field. Not surprisingly, we didn't win a ribbon, but I felt amazing. It's one thing to get a blue on an experienced show horse at the age of 14, and quite another to survive pandemonium on The Meenster as a middle-aged rookie!

Thanks so much for dropping by and visiting Nancy, and sharing that great *cough* show experience! We are glad you both survived! To learn more, as well as Nancy's other interesting occupation, please visit her website at http://www.nancydifabbio.com/

Meet Jane Ayres - Guest Blog

From time to time we feature a guest blog from another horse author. Today we welcome UK author Jane Ayres, who has published several horse novels for children and teens. She also has a piece in WHY WE RIDE.

Sharing the journey

by Jane Ayres

When I was a child I avidly read every pony book I could lay my hands on.  My favourites were by the Pullein-Thompson sisters - Diana, Christine or Josephine - and I devoured tales about girls who were lucky enough to have a pony.  I wanted to be those girls, so I started to write my own pony stories.  With a twist.  Because, after pony books, my next favourite reading subject was ghosts and the supernatural.  So I wrote a creepy tale called Dream Pony about a girl whose perfect new mount goes unexpectedly berserk at a horse show.  It doesn’t end well for the girl or her pony, but it was the first story I got published by a short lived but wonderful UK magazine called Pony World.  I was 14 years old and the thrill of getting my work in print was….well, it’s hard to put into words.  (Ironically!) 

Since then I have written many “straight” pony tales but I especially enjoy combining two genres. Sometimes, the supernatural element is implied or ambiguous rather than explicit.  I am interested in exploring the dark side of characters (and horses), especially in my last few books, The Horse on the Balcony, Dark Horses, The Runaway Horse and Last Chance Horse. 

But the novel I am currently writing reflects another thread that runs through many of my books.  Often the “life journey” of the characters, human or animal, is paralleled with an actual journey.  It’s only in later years that I have realized how much this figures for me - and how far back it all goes.  When I was 10, I started to write a pony novel which was never finished.  It reflected my reading influences, which, as well as pony books,  included a lot of Enid Blyton Famous Five, Secret Seven and boarding school stories. My novel featured two girls (whose names I can’t recall) and their ponies, Nutmeg and Shadow.  The girls are away at boarding school when they get the news that Shadow has been stolen, so, with no clues whatever, they secretly run away from school, with a few friends, and set off on a horseback mission to solve the mystery and get their pony back.  Midnight rides and picnics also featured heavily!

The second book I had published, in my mid twenties, was called Wild Horse Island and the main character is Zephyr, a wild horse who is taken from his herd on a remote island and begins a long journey to find his way home, encountering two lonely people whose lives he changes.  More than twenty years later, I was asked to update the story and extend it before it was republished as Zephyr of Wild Horse Island.  This book remains dear to my heart.  Years later, without even realizing it, I explored related themes in Coming Home, a rare non-horsey novel about a girl and her two Norwegian Forest cats who are tragically parted but, after many adventures, find each other once more. 

When I got thinking about the stories that grip me as a reader, they often involved characters undertaking, often unwillingly, some kind of journey.  I like to feel when I am reading that I am sharing that journey with the characters, whether it is a girl trying to find her stolen horse, or a loyal pony finding its way back home.  I believe the act of reading, and writing,  a book is a kind of journey.  And I hope I will be travelling for a long time to come.

To learn more about Jane and her books, follow her blog: www.janeayres.blogspot.com or find out more about her books here:

http://janeayres.ponymadbooklovers.co.uk/

Thanks so much for dropping by and visiting, Jane. European readers, have any of you read Jane's books?

My Friend, Valentino

Please enjoy this guest post from Lisa Wysocky, therapeutic horse trainer and consultant, about a horse that is very special to her.

Horse lovers know all horses are special. We also know sometimes a horse comes along that is more extraordinary than the others. Valentino is one of those horses.

 I first saw Valentino as a three-year-old. He was a black Tennessee Walking Horse cross, 13.2, skin and bones, pacing back and forth with his nose raised above the top rail of a round pen. Valentino’s human “family” had moved away when he was a yearling and abandoned him. Neighbors threw hay when they could, but Vali might have starved to death had he not been rescued by Knoxville’s Horse Haven of Tennessee when he was three.

At the time, I was the equine trainer at a therapeutic riding center near Nashville. Several of our instructors visited Valentino at a horse fair where he was in a trailering demonstration. Next thing I know I was turning this neglected rescue into a therapy horse.

Having lived entirely on his own during his formative years, Valentino did not know how to relate to people or to other horses. I called several veterinary schools that suggested I put him in a paddock by himself where he could watch people and horses interact. Done.

In the meantime, center volunteers and I began to teach Valentino to lead, tie, pick up his feet, and accept a saddle and bridle. I also began a desensitization process, for here was a horse that had never experienced much of anything.

Over the next months I became amazed at the intelligence of this horse. He was often fearful (of entering a strange building, of people he didn’t know, of things he had never seen, such as a carriage) but he rarely backed away. Instead, he’d visibly shake as he carefully smelled the person or object and then slowly let out a deep breath. Over and over, Vali became comfortable with new objects and people and I watched his confidence grow.

Eight months after his arrival, Valentino was turned out with an older gelding whose paddock bordered Vali’s. They became good friends. A month later he was turned out with several other horses. By this time our thoughtful little horse had gained several hundred pounds and grown four inches.

Before I knew it Valentino had begun therapy lessons. About a year later I had the opportunity to adopt Valentino, and I included him in demonstrations in several clinics. He is a featured horse in my book and DVD, My Horse, My Partner: Teamwork on the Ground, and has a chapter in Cheryl Dudley’s book, Horses That Save Lives. Other trainers requested him for clinics and videos but I knew Valentino was a born therapy horse. He has now, at age nine, been at Therapeutic Animal Partners for more than four years.

I become angry when I think how Valentino’s original family threw him away. How could anyone do that? Yet it happens all the time. I have now come to trust Valentino implicitly in lessons. He is the first to let me know a rider is off balance. He also knows if a rider needs help following a set of instructions, which he carries out on his own, or if the rider needs to work for it. We helped one rider visually by throwing a Frisbee and having the rider ride to it. Once there, Vali would drop his head and pick the Frisbee up in his mouth. Comic relief can go a long way.

  Valentino’s story does not end here. I, with the help of staff, volunteers, and riders at Therapeutic Animal Partners, nominated Valentino for PATH (Professional Association of Therapeutic Horsemanship) International Equine of the Year. On November 12, at an international awards banquet in Lexington, Kentucky, it was announced that our little rescue horse, Valentino, had won this prestigious honor.

Every day, Valentino inspires me. If he can survive abandonment, then I, too, can survive difficult things. If he can overcome his fears, then so can I. And, so can everyone who is inspired by Valentino and his story.

Wow. Thank you so much, Lisa, for sharing Valentino's story with us! Amazing. To learn more about Lisa, as well as her brand new novel called THE OPIUM EQUATION, please visit her website at http://www.lisawysocky.com./

Guest Blogger--Sandy James

I'm happy to welcome back Sandy James as a guest blogger today.

SPRINGTIME

It’s springtime again in Indiana. Of course, we had snow flurries this week, but... In the Hoosier state, you can never count on spring and warmth to co-exist. With the arrival of April comes the opening of Hoosier Park. Yes, my friends, we’re racing horses again!

I stood in the winner’s circle for the first time this season on my first trip up to Anderson. Between the eight hours I spend dazzling kids in my classrooms, the time I devote to churning out edits, and the hours of trying to add pages to my many “works in progress,” I don’t get to see my horses nearly as often as I’d like. So to have a visit to the winner’s circle on my first trip truly made the drive to Hoosier Park worthwhile. The cherry on top of the sundae was that the winning horse was Heart’s Prince – my homebred four-year-old.

I wrote about Prince the last time I blogged for Equestrian Ink. At that time, he’d finally won his first race, and I was in hopes we would have some success with him. His two-year-old season hadn’t really been much more than a few qualifiers and some less than stellar races. That first win was the beginning of his three-year-old season, which I’m happy to say was a success. He found his way into the winner’s circle three times. Most of his earning, however, came from Prince’s constantly finding himself a bridesmaid. He finished second eight times. For a horse who seemed to act like racing was the furthest thing from his equine brain, we were pleased to see him pacing so well.

Prince is a chestnut – a typical redhead. Hot temper and passionate nature. He used to be a pain both on and off the track. Luckily, he seems to have matured. Don’t get me wrong, he’s still an ass around the track. It’s one of the reasons we keep him with a trainer who stables on a farm.

The first time this season Prince was led to the track for a pari-mutuel race, he reared enough he almost unseated our driver, Jason Dillander. And in the paddock, he doesn’t exactly wait patiently for his race. But at the farm, when he’s away from the track, he’s affectionate and easier to manage. He’s also fallen in love with our trainer’s girlfriend, Renay. She’s the only one

who can keep him calm in the paddock. Prince obviously has a crush on her.

That fire inside Prince showed itself in the race I watched. The first quarter had been slow, and Prince had been parked in second, riding the pocket behind the leader. But as they approached the half, Jason took him around the leader and started to set his own pace. That move is always a big gamble that often leads to the horse being too tired to finish strong in the stretch. I think I groaned and threw a frown at my husband who sighed in return. We both feared the race would have a very unhappy ending.

As the field rounded the last turn, Prince’s lead started to dwindle as the pack, one horse especially, closed in on him. My heart sank as I figured Prince would fade. But he didn’t. In fact, when the inside horse drew eye-to-eye with him, Prince refused to let him pass. That kind of desire to win came from his parents. They were both fantastic and tenacious competitors. Prince not only held his ground, he opened up a lead again. He won by a good length.

Heavens, how I love my little chestnut. Is it any wonder I modeled Katie’s horse – Spun Gold – in Murphy’s Law after him? Speaking of Murphy’s Law, I’m pleased to say it has done well since the ebook release last month. It’s nice to know people love to read about horses. I’ve also had a couple of great reviews of the story from Night Owl Romance and Coffee Time Romance. Look for the book to appear in print in June. My May ebook release, All the Right Reasons, takes readers back to the track to reconnect with the Murphy’s Law characters and introduce some new people and new horses.

Let’s hope this season will be just as great for Heart’s Prince as the last.

Photo by Linscott Photography
******

Sandy James

http://www.sandy-james.com/

Guest Blogger--Patti Brooks, author of Fame and Deceit

I'm happy to welcome guest blogger, Patti Brooks. Patti is the author of an equestrian fiction book, Fame and Deceit. Welcome, Patti!!!

Setting my stories in the horse world is a given as I’ve been immersed in everything horse since, at age nine, I earned my pony’s keep by giving ten-cent pony rides. Writing was in my blood as well and as a teen I sold my first article to a national magazine for $3.00. That sealed my fate. I spent my life with horses and writing.

I kept a notebook of story ideas with the thought that since I am a professional horse trainer, someday I’d be bound to break a bone and be laid up for six or so weeks and then I would write the first of many books. Sure...dash off a publishable first novel in six weeks!

Fortunately I did not break a bone but I did learn my way around a computer and a non-horse story was put in my lap, begging to become a novel. Four years of research and another four to polish sufficiently to catch the eye of a publisher and that story became Mountain Shadows ( a historical set in the Prohibition era in the Adirondacks). I am pleased that it has become required reading in a number of Adirondack high schools. It taught me I had to make time to write and for me that meant starting my days at four a.m.

Now that I had some basics, I thought my first book set in the horse world would be a cinch. Certainly did not need four years of research to get my setting down. I lived my life surrounded by all things horse.

I took part of a number of workshops and found them priceless. But I was surprised at the feedback encouraging me to flesh out the horsey stuff. I always fret about being too preachy. I want to tell an intriguing story, not teach my readers how to train a horse.

When I sent Fame & Deceit out in the world to find first an agent who would then find a publisher I could work with, I received oodles of stock rejections and quite a few requests for the entire manuscript. Some of those came back with worthwhile suggestions that I acted upon, some came back saying horses don’t act like that, and others came back saying an audience of primarily horse people wouldn’t sell enough books.

That is what frustrates me! Why couldn’t Fame & Deceit be as successful as Tom Clancy’s first novel, Hunt for Red October, that is set in the submarine world? Certainly more people would be intrigued reading a murder mystery with horses trotting through it than with submarines lurking under the seas! Were his readers mostly sailors? Course not.

But even if a reader has to like horses to enjoy my novel, that is hardly restrictive. The American Horse Council’s independent survey indicates there are 13 million people in the US over eighteen that consider themselves to be horse people. I’d be happy selling a book to half of them!

But there’s another rub! I was fortunate with my first novel to receive dozens of letters from kind folks who praised the book. Unfortunately, so many of them proudly told me they passed the book on to friend after friend. Given what an author makes on the sale of one book, readers need to be encouraged to send their friends to the bookstore to buy the book. Just before Christmas (four years after the book came out) a woman sent me a handwritten note saying she passed her copy on to fifteen people. Heart-warming, but not wallet-filling.

These are things I grumble about, but it won’t stop me from completing the next book in the series.

Patti's Bio:

There were times when my husband, Bob, and I had as many as a hundred Morgan Horses on our farm in East Lyme, CT. Although I’ve been an avid horse show exhibitor, my real love is competitive distance riding and being open to take on off-beat endeavors. With my Morgan stallion, Peppertime, we appeared in TV commercials and were chosen to jump out of a horse-size birthday cake to celebrate the bicentennial of the Morgan Horse.

I have served as President of the New England Morgan Horse Assn. and was inducted into the American Morgan Horse Association’s Hall of Fame. Currently she is sePrving a term as President of the Eastern Competitive Trail Ride Assn. and teaches a fiction writing class at a local community college.

Patti's Author Page at Aberdeen Bay Publishing

"You're Writing a Novel About What?" by Guest Blogger--Marilyn Fisher

I'm very happy to introduce our first guest blogger, Marilyn Fisher. Marilyn is the author of "The Case of Three Dead Horses."

YOU’RE WRITING A NOVEL ABOUT WHAT?

by Marilyn Fisher

My critique colleagues in Virginia were shocked. “About horses that get killed,” I told them. I had good reason. In my home state of New York, where I learned to ride, I had read an article by a vet that still resonated with me. What that anonymous man or woman said was the starting point for my first novel, The Case of the Three Dead Horses, thus turning me into a novelist. Writing the novel, in turn, led to my horse protection web site.

The vet’s story was short, its message brutal. Writing immediately after finishing a necropsy, the anonymous vet said that the horse had died in such a way that its murder could not be confirmed. The killer would have had to have a veterinary’s knowledge of equine anatomy to perform the murder. Because nothing could be proved, the owner would get a large insurance settlement. The tone of the article was tired, bitter. The vet had seen too many murderers rewarded when the method of killing was hard to prove. An insurance company somewhere was on the hook once again. What must have been maddening was the necessity for anonymity. Whistle-blower vets lose clients and may be in physical danger.

Slowly I accumulated evidence about the crime of killing horses. I discovered that no one likes to talk or write about it. On a research trip to Kentucky, I strained to hear the words as a woman whispered a sad story; back home in Virginia, a man wanted me to write an article about horse abuse but his veterinarian friend, who had told the man about it, refused to cooperate with me.

Like all equine fiction writers, I wanted to tell a horse-centered story, in this case, a mystery, with an entertaining, fast-paced plot and characters the reader would have strong feelings about.

Eventually, my novel took shape, the leading character, equine insurance investigator Connie Holt, who has her first experience with the crime of killing horses. Since I lived in beautiful Virginia, I set the story in horse country there. As the novel unfolded, I found myself inventing a lustful state cop, a wealthy, arrogant client, a vet who doesn’t return Connie’s love, and an assortment of other characters, all of whom play a part in her investigation to discover how the horses were killed, why they were murdered, and who ended their lives. One of the joys was creating the horses in Connie’s community, both valuable, highly-bred horses like Woolwine, Quicksilver Magical Pete, Finn Maccumhail, and Ali Ben Bahir, and less prestigious but equally lovable horses like George, Sam and Suzie.

Here’s an excerpt. Connie Holt is on call. At a breeding farm in the Blue Ridge Mountains, a horse lies dead in his stall and there are other complications. Read on:

When the phone on her bedside table rang, waking her out of a deep, dreamless sleep, insurance agent Connie Holt groaned. She’d spent the day visiting three farms to discuss complicated insurance claims the owners had submitted to the McCutcheon Equine Insurance Agency. Since the farms were widely separated from each other in Bedford, Amherst and Nelson counties, she’d been in her truck too many hours. She’d gone to bed around eight o’clock that night, her back and head aching. Now she remembered that it was her turn to be on night duty. The caller was probably her boss, Cary McCutcheon. A horse must be injured, sick or dead somewhere. It would be her job to examine the horse at the site and write a detailed report. Sighing, she put on her glasses.

“That you, Cary?”

“Sorry, Connie.”

She mouthed a silent “Hell!” into the darkness of her warm, cozy bedroom.

“It’s Rod Payson’s horse Woolwine,” Cary continued. “Dead.”

“That marvelous stallion? Poor Rod. First Donna’s death and now this.”

“And to make it worse,” said Cary, “there’s a dead man in the stall. Rod said he knew him. Police are on their way. Rod called them first, then his veterinarian, Jase Tyree, then us. Be careful driving up there, the roads are terrible. Ice storm.” Both of them knew it would be a hard trip to Payson’s isolated horse farm in Amherst County. The hilly roads would be slippery and treacherous.

My horse protection web site at http://www.mmfisher.com/ is “dedicated to the well-being of horses, dream animals who live side-by-side with us.” I’d love it if readers would visit, and drop me a note about anything you see there or read in the novel.

I’m again writing about Connie Holt, with some of the familiar characters from The Case of the Three Dead Horses and new ones, among them, a trainer and jump jockeys. This time, the main plot will be about Connie’s involvement in the International Gold Cup Races of Virginia in which Cary’s fabulous black horse named Darkling Lord is running. She’ll also be unraveling the mystery of two valuable oil paintings, and her personal life will again be affected by the investigation.

I’ll close with some nice words from Shakespeare that I’m sure every rider feels are true: “When I bestride him I soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes.” Remember them as you ride down those spring trails in the coming weeks.

Marilyn