The Stallion King

by Glenn Balch

I'm in the middle of a longer book but needed an easy read for a hot bath, and this was it. Unfortunately I found out pretty quick that like Indian Paint, this book is an abridged version of the original (titled Wild Horse). Wasn't quite as "dumbed down" so I was able to enjoy it somewhat; however it still doesn't really sound like the author's voice to me and will only stay on my shelf until I find a copy of Wild Horse. 

It's about two kids who have been admiring a wild black stallion that lives near their father's cattle ranch. The father doesn't see much use in wild horses so he doesn't mind when men come to run the wild horses, intending to sell whatever they catch for rodeo broncos or to a factory that makes chicken feed. The kids are appalled that the wild stallion they call King might meet such a fate. The boy determines to go out and catch the wild horse himself, and his sister helps by bringing supplies and fresh horses. It is a long hard job which they mainly do by following the stallion in relays until he's worn out. Most of this story felt really flat and bland to me- the dialog and descriptions- but that is probably due to it being "revised". The final chapters were more interesting, after the horse is caught. The ranch hand is from South America.  He uses a bola for the capture instead of a lariat and his methods for getting the wild horse to accept some basic tack were also interesting. I liked that the horse's behavior and responses were very realistic. Eventually they teach the horse that it can't get away from a rope and are riding it (although it's not really controllable). The kids are so excited to have the wild stallion, but also dismayed that it seems the horse will never really accept confinement or guidance from a rider- having lived so many years in the wild and being set in his ways. But if they let him go again, he's at risk of being caught by others and sold to rodeo or slaughterhouse. The way they solve this problem is neatly done and honestly I didn't expect it at all, even though it was hinted at in the opening scene, I missed it.

Definitely think I'd like the original version of this story. Happily I found a website that lists Glenn Balch's books and notes which ones are revised reprints, so maybe I can avoid this mistake again.

Rating: 2/5            118 pages, 1960

Ravensong

A Natural and Fabulous History of Ravens and Crows

by Catherine Feher Elston

     The cleverness and pervasive success of ravens and crows has been recognized by humans in many cultures, for ages. In native american tribes the raven is often seen as a creator or a spirit guide, although in other minds ravens are associated with death (because they feed on carrion). This book is a kind of celebration of ravens- the first part has legends and creation stories featuring Raven from various Pacific Northwest tribes, the middle part is some native american history (with the raven connection a thin tangent that is barely mentioned) and the final section is more factual about raven behavior with quotations from some scientific studies including several from Bernd Henrich and Konrad Lorenz (which in my opinion are better read in their original context). The first part was good, I had mixed feelings about the middle, and the last section wasn't anything new to me. Actually one of the better parts is the afterward, where the author describes some of her own work rehabilitating and caring for injured ravens. So the book feels rather uneven and sometimes the wording was odd or I felt dubious about the content. It would have been nice to have more of the legends, or more detail about the personal experiences. I could have really done without the history section, which had a different tone entirely and felt out of place to me. I did really like the inked illustrations by Lawrence Ormsby, very nice.

Rating: 2/5                       208 pages, 1991

The Hopes of Snakes

and Other Tales from the Urban Landscape 

by Lisa Couturier

I can't quite put my finger on why this book fell flat for me. It's a collection of essays describing the landscape and encounters with wildlife the author had when living in New York City and the area surrounding Washington, DC. Some of the encounters are brief- just a glimpse of a coyote- others are more personal- helping a researcher find and catch snakes in a field, following crows to locate their roosting site. Interspersed with quotes that felt meaningful (and I recognized many of them) but were a bit too frequent- I would have rather heard more of the author's own words. Also interspersed with details or asides about her personal life- including what felt like a disconnect with religion while being surrounded by religious people- but just a glimpse of this, never felt connected enough. It always loops around again to the animal the chapter is about, but sometimes in such a skipping, circling manner I didn't feel it strongly. She describes a longing to know wild animals better, to know more details about their lives- and shares what she's learned from reading (I was interested in the insights about coyotes. For example- I always thought they rebounded from intense "predator control" by having larger litters but this book tells me it's also because if a dominant pair is removed from an area, all the younger coyotes are suddenly free to breed, no longer held in check by their social hierarchy). This book is full of the type of material I usually enjoy- personal encounters with wildlife and interesting facts about them- but the analogies didn't speak to me, the descriptive language often felt too flowery, the wanderings asides left me feeling lost. I shut it at the end feeling disappointed. Maybe it's just that this author's writing style is not to my taste. 

In case it is of interest, the animals featured in this book include mice, red-tailed hawks, crows, snakes, coyotes, peregrine falcons, canada geese, vultures, a barn owl, gorillas (in a zoo), ants, pigeons, cockroaches, toads, bald eagles, foxes and deer. I just wish I had liked it more.

 Rating: 2/5           160 pages, 2005

Whimsy the Talking Pony

by Sandy Duval 

     Cute story about Jamie, a boy on a ranch who gets a pony for his birthday. Rather like in Summer Pony, he brings home a thin, scruffy pony with overgrown hooves, even though his father urges him to pick out one of the many well-groomed and healthier horses. This is because he feels sure he heard the pony talking to him at the auction ring, urging him to buy it. It's long hard work to get his pony in shape so meanwhile another kid at the neighboring ranch teases him about having acquired a useless pony. Jamie is further frustrated when he can't coax the pony to talk again, until he's almost certain he dreamed it. He didn't- it just doesn't want to talk unless there's a real need. Well, eventually the pony's feet are in better condition and he can ride- so they go on secret night-time adventures. They find a herd of wild horses that the pony originally came from (with a lame explanation for why the pony can talk). The wild horses are finding it difficult to live because ranches surrounding them are fencing off the best pastures and watering places. So Jamie and his pony lead the herd to a safer place- with the help of the kid next door, who gets in on the secret, and Jamie's parents (who don't). Spoiler! I kind of liked that in the end, things aren't perfect for Jamie- the pony goes back to live with the wild horses. But the closing page has Jamie at the auction with his dad again to buy another pony, one that winks at him, suggesting he'll soon have a new equine friend.

This little book was a fun read on a rather dull day, but it's not a keeper for me. While the story has a lot of nice elements (including some realistic equine behavior and details on their care), the whole thing feels rather awkward and unpolished- the pacing, the dialog, even the illustrations. I'm sorry to sound harsh, but it feels like a book written by a high school student, or by a parent for their kid's amusement, rather than one that went through publishing avenues. Although considering the age group (early middle grade) it's aimed at, I doubt young readers would notice anything about the quality. 

Rating: 2/5                100 pages, 1980

A Small, Elderly Dragon

by Beverly Keller 

     Amusing little story about a kingdom with a foolish king, a smart but drab princess, and a lurking dragon on the mountain. They all get into a mess of trouble when a sorcerer is brought in to deal with the dragon (who doesn't want to fight knights or eat sacrificial victims). The sorcerer has soon ousted the king, banished the king's advisor and locked all the knights in the dungeon. It's up to the princess and a few stout young men to defeat the sorcerer, if they can only free the dragon! First he gets trapped under a landslide in his own cave, then he gets shrunk by the sorcerer and locked in a birdcage. It's funny and quirky, but events move through the scenes so fast I sometimes wondered what the heck was going on. There's secret identities and unspoken love interests (which I didn't at all see coming, so that threw me a bit at the end). I did like a lot of the wordplay, especially when characters offered other words in rapid succession when they didn't understand what someone said- made me chuckle. My favorite character was the grumpy dragon, however after his second entrapment he doesn't do much. A quick read. 

Rating: 2/5                        144 pages, 1984

Dragon and Liberator

by Timothy Zahn 

     Sorry book, I skimmed most of you. The more convoluted the plot got, with suspicions abounding about who knows what about whom, who is infiltrating or conniving or scheming about what- well, I just lost interest. Kayna and Taneem stow away inside a bomb-rigged safe to get aboard the enemy spaceship; Jack and Draycos wind up in jail, then get sprung and for the bulk of the story are hiding on another ship in a gap between the hull and the inner wall- each party spying on the crew and those in charge, sowing unrest in the thin alliance their enemies hold, and attempting to sabotage the ultimate weapon. There's lots of sneaking through air ducts, and using sophisticated tools to eavesdrop. Kayna isn't who we thought she was (no surprise) and Jack finds out a few more obscure secrets about his past. Taneem realizes she can slid onto other people's skin without them even being aware (the guy was asleep) which was kind of weird, but not really explored much. In the end more about the K'da background and their bond with humans came to light, which is really why I pushed through this. My main curiosity was about the ongoing development of the K'da/human relationship, and the interactions between the four main characters- but this book was much more about the tension and excitement of space battle. Not really for me. However fans of the author like how this wrapped up the series with drama and speed, so there you are.

Borrowed from the public library.

Rating: 2/5                364 pages, 2008

A Thousand Miles to Freedom

My Escape from North Korea 

by Eunsun Kim 

with Sebastien Falletti, translated by David Tian 

A simply told memoir about a young woman whose family was starving in North Korea. Her grandparents and father died during a famine, and she literally though she would also starve in their apartment. No food in the city. With her mother and sister, she made several attempts to cross the border into China, then make a difficult journey to South Korea where she hoped to live in freedom. They had to pay enormous sums to smugglers, suffered at the hands of human traffickers in China, and when finally reaching South Korea spent months in detainment as the government interrogated everyone to ensure they weren't spies, then gave them lessons on assimilating into South Korean society and how to live in a capitalist system. Eunsun Kim tells how she nearly died of hunger, was forced as a child to watch public executions, and only gradually realized afterwards that she'd been brainwashed in her homeland, that life was really different elsewhere and the regime in power oppressed the common people. She relates how the trials of attempting to leave North Korea strained her family, and how desperate she felt to reunite with her sister who initially stayed behind in China. How confusing living in a new country with a totally different system was, let alone having to learn a new language. I have nothing but admiration for someone who went through such hard times, and kept trying again even when their first attempt failed, when they barely had any energy, when they had to wait months or even a year for the next step in their journey. And yet the book left me rather unmoved. Whether the plain writing style, or the fact that it's not only co-authored but also translated, it just wasn't very engaging and lacked depth. However there's others on my TBR list now about the same subject: The Girl with Seven Names, Nothing to Envy, In Order to Live or Under the Same Sky.

Rating: 2/5                 228 pages, 2015

The Return

Animorphs #48 

by K.A. Applegate 

     I didn't like this one. SPOILERS! 

It starts with Rachel, Jake and the rest on a field trip tour of the White House- when the aliens bust in, chaos ensues, the President is in a helicopter trying to take off while aliens attack it, Jake tells Rachel they're leaving but she keeps fighting, gets mad and starts fighting Jake as tiger, in her grizzly bear morph, on the White House lawn. Snap- it's all a dream! but things aren't quite right- Rachel goes about her day feeling that everything's off, arguing with her friends, hearing rats in the walls, seeing red lights flash- turns out she's having another nightmare. Or is she? After being attacked by hordes of rats and nearly drowning in a pond she wakes up in a dungeon, locked in a small plastic cube. David-the-rat returns and threatens to force her into becoming a rat forever, just like him. Cassie appears nearby, also locked in a cube. Rachel has to choose between following David's demands, or loosing Cassie. Except- how does a kid trapped in a rat body acquire or build perfect locking plastic-box cages? It was really too far-fetched. There's other plot holes, too. Which turns out to be explained because most of it isn't real-

Meanwhile Rachel is reliving all her bad moments, agonizing over how much she enjoys fighting, facing the maniacal violent side of herself. Crayak shows up- the evil all-powerful counterpart to the Ellimist- and it turns out he's playing mind games with Rachel. He morphs her into a superhero version of herself, then back into the cage as a rat, back and forth, until she's going crazy. He pits her against Visser One in an arena, where they battle it out, using their morphing powers. This was kinda interesting, and kinda eye-rolling. Aliens and mind games and shape-shifting abilities in this series, and now we have superhero powers too? I just wasn't on board with that. Why did it have to introduce another fantastical element that hasn't been a part of the worldbuilding in this series at all to date? Like when they gained dinosaur morphs but then couldn't use them after travelling back through time. Pointless. Unless there's going to be super-Rachel in one of the last few books too? I have my suspicions though. It was an interesting look at Rachel's deepest inner fears, facing the part of her that is eager to use violence and her conflicting feelings about group leadership, how she feels used by the others sometimes, etc- but I got tired pretty quick of the repeated angst and the ridiculous fight scenes. In the end, Rachel is left in an alley facing David-the-rat, who is begging her to just kill him, he'd rather die than go back to the island. Rachel is agonizing over what to do, and the book ends without disclosing her decision. That really irritated me too.

 Rating: 2/5                148 pages, 2000 

More opinions: 

the Library Ladies

Thistle-Chaser 

Arkham Reviews 

Animorphology

The Weakness

Animorphs #37
by K.A. Applegate

Wow, it's been a long time. I didn't really feel like reading Animorphs again, but my other current read is a tough book- so I need breaks between chapters, and this happens to be a good alternative, in an odd way. Turns out I read half of The Weakness months and months ago, then put it down and forgot about it. Don't remember why. Skimmed a bit to remind myself of the storyline, but didn't bother to re-read entire chapters again. Jake is absent so the team decides to put Rachel in charge when a report comes in of discovering the Visser's secret feeding spot. They can't pass up the opportunity to try and get the enemy. Rachel is all for just trying to chase him down (using a new cheetah morph) but of course they fail. Also meet a new alien creature, the only good thing here being that the Visser and this new enemy the Inspector appear to despise each other, which is to the Animorphs' advantage. Then they decide to rush around town storming different shops and locations one after the other making it appear that they have much larger numbers than in reality, so the Visser will look bad in front of the Inspector. Causing a lot of conspicuous damage and probably hurting innocent people (not like them at all). Then to bash in on a meeting of high-up Controllers, all of them using polar bear form instead of their usual battle morphs. It goes badly. Cassie gets captured and almost forced into the Yeerk pool. The others barely save her in time- using bird of prey morphs and one cobra. They pretty much only escape because when Marco-as-cobra takes the Inspector down, the Visser and all his underlings just stand there staring, instead of grabbing the Animorphs who are exhausted and injured. All these frenetic attacks without much planning were Rachel's push, but she has doubts the whole time and feels terrible about putting her friends in danger and afterwards when Jake returns asks him: how do you do it? how can you stand to make those decisions, putting your friends' lives on the line? He flinches for a moment then closes it off and says: I just don't think about it. Well, I could have done without all the hectic nonsense fighting scenes, but the ending had a more serious note.

Rating: 2/5                144 pages, 1999

more opinions:
The Library Ladies
Arkham Reviews
Snips and Snails and Puppy Dog Tales

A Pigeon and a Boy

by Meir Shalev

I didn't realize this when I first picked it up (at the Book Thing), but it's a love story. Two love stories actually- past and present which have an almost too tidy connection, but also confused me at first keeping straight who was who. Doesn't help that the narrator sometimes addresses his mother in second person, other times referring to her in third. Not just in the same chapter or paragraph, but often in the same sentence. This is also a war story, and pigeons have a key role, because several of the main characters work in pigeon lofts. Two of them start as young people, boy and girl in different cities, sending love notes to each other via the birds (even though they're only supposed to carry official messages). I did like the parts about the pigeons and how they are kept, the symbolism quite strong as a lot of this story is also about home. What makes a home, what holds you there, what draws you back when you've been away. And a large part is also about one character (present day) having an old house remodeled to suit his tastes exactly. Some parts were interesting and others bored me a lot and then a key event occurs which seemed so implausible (plus the pigeons start talking to people- and this is not a talking animal story- maybe they were delusional?) that I really had difficulty finishing the book at all. Well, it certainly was a romantic idea, but kind of ridiculous too. I did not like the ending. Characters did things that seemed really unlike them, made no sense, and even angered me. This one's not staying in my collection.

Rating: 2/5                  311 pages, 2007

Maverick Cats

Encounters with Feral Cats

by Ellen Perry Berkeley

The author and her husband lived in a rural area of Vermont, and soon noticed cats around their property. At one time or another they fed or closely observed six different cats, and here describe the feline characters. Some only came to eat and they left again without much interaction. One brought her kittens, which disappeared within a few days. An obviously ill black cat staggered onto their driveway, laid down and died (while the author watched from inside, considering shooting the cat to end its misery but unable to bring herself to do so). Two male cats- one that hangs around for a while then goes off to make its individual living elsewhere- they often see it at some distance in a field later on- and another which starts to act pushy towards a female cat they really admire- are prominent characters. The cat that gets the most pages is a female tortoiseshell that gradually became very friendly and eventually lived inside their house. In alternate chapters the author discusses facts about feral cats. There's several studies on feral cat populations on individual islands mentioned, how the cats do or do not affect other animal populations. Other studies on feral cat numbers in different areas of the country, how prevalent disease is among them, how old they live, etc etc are also referenced. This book was written before trap-neuter-release was really done, so other methods of control- and questioning the need for it at all- is gone over. Reports on findings inside the stomachs of feral cats are given, indicating that they don't kill many songbirds- the vast majority of their prey is rodents. It's a nice little book, but seems to have so many unknowns stated, especially in those chapters on studies that don't have any consensus- because many of them were not finished, or done extensively enough, or had different results in different areas. The main conclusion I drew was that cats are definitely survivors, they don't really need people, they are very much individuals, and thus is all the more a mystery and pleasure when they share your home. But I would have preferred more detail about the cats the author personally knew, then reading all the people she quoted. Maybe this is one of the first books to consolidate research on feral cats, but if so it's done rather casually is my opinion.

Rating: 2/5           142 pages, 1982

Grow More With Less

Sustainable Gardening Methods
by Vincent A. Simeone

This book looks nice, but was a disappointment for me. It has thick, glossy paper and clear photographs, but they're often not identified so you might not know which of the plants in the text is pictured. As the material seems aimed at beginning gardeners, this felt lacking. I do appreciate the message, to use gardening methods that are environmentally friendly and cost effective: saving water, selecting plants that require less care, encouraging wildlife etc. However there wasn't much new material in here for me. It wasn't interesting until page 90 where I was looking forward to the chapters about integrated pest management and attracting wildlife, but even that felt bland. I dutifully finished the book hoping to glean something, and noticed after a while that a lot of the text is repetitive, there are quite a few typos, and the information never gets deep enough to actually be useful. For example, the charts never tell you much more than the text itself did. One section in the book says you should survey insect pests on your plants regularly and lists things to gather for the task, but then doesn't tell you how to use the items. Also, the chapter intros have a printed background of burlap texture, which makes the text annoyingly hard to read (might have worked if the font was bold for those pages). It also tends to veer slightly off-topic sometimes, into other ways you can make your home and landscape more 'green'. Not just about gardening, and I didn't learn a bunch of new ways to recycle and save in the garden like I'd hoped. So I can't recommend it, except to absolute beginners who want a nice general introduction into organic, sustainable gardening.

Rating: 2/5              192 pages, 2013

Talking to Strangers

by Malcolm Gladwell

I finished a book. I didn't really like it, so am having a hard time thinking what to say. The subtitle: What We Should Know About the People We Don't Know. Which seems to be, in a nutshell: you'll never be able to judge strangers accurately. You will misread their facial expressions, truthfulness and intentions more than half the time. This book has lots of examples from famous court cases, encounters with police gone badly wrong, incidents of sexual assault and pedophilia, meetings between enemy leaders of countries, high ranking FBI agents who were duped by spies for years and so on. All about how people who are trained to pick out the lies and find the wrongdoers are so very often wrong. There's a part about studies that show how deprivation and torture makes prisoners very bad about providing information- it affects the brain, the memory- so the info they do give is probably inaccurate. So why do people keep getting tortured in order to extract information? There's another section all about suicides- in particular with details on Sylvia Plath- which I found educational to read in one sense, and very upsetting in another. The takeaway seems to be: as a human race we're bad at judging people we don't know. We guess wrong. So stop trying? It doesn't really give any suggestions on that. Only that we shouldn't be too harsh on people who were taken in by strangers or misled, because it's so very easy to fall prey. I found the implications depressing honestly. There's a lot more, but I don't really feel like thumbing through the book to remind myself of them right now. Check out Goodreads, or some of the links below. Lots of different opinions on this one.

Borrowed from my sister.

Rating: 2/5            386 pages, 2019

more opinions:
Book'd Out
Rhapsody in Books Weblog
anyone else?

Paradise Under Glass

An Amateur Creates a Conservatory Garden
by Ruth Kassinger

I don't know if it's just my mental state, but I found this book a disappointment. It seemed right up my alley- a woman who could barely keep a single houseplant alive, suddenly feels inspired to build what I'd call a large sunroom onto her house to replace an old deck. She stocks it with fruit trees and vibrant tropical foliage plants, learning by mistakes and with the guidance of a helpful local nursery employee. Becoming enthused with all the green growing things, she travels to visit commercial greenhouses and public arboretums, admiring a living green wall, learning about the history of clivias and Victorian fern hunters, seeing what it takes for an operation to produce thousands of houseplants for sale. She tells a lot about the history of greenhouses- starting with how citrus trees were first imported from China to other countries and kept alive through the winters- and early plant collectors and the architecture of glass buildings and so much of that overwhelmed the main story and made my eyes swim. I really was not interested in all the historical people and their doings. I'd have rather just read the personal bits- the part about butterflies was really wonderful, also the chapter on how she battled infestations in her sunroom and learned about beneficial bugs. The section about her sister's poor health very sad but also felt a little out of place. In all it was a rather uneven read for me- I really liked reading about her own plants and how she learned to care for them, but the historical sections failed to hold my interest.

Borrowed from the public library.

Rating: 2/5          347 pages, 2010

Chi's Sweet Adventures

vol 4
by Konami Kanata
Adapted by Kinoko Natsume

This fourth volume of Chi's Sweet Adventures is obviously aiming more at entertaining children watching the cute tv show, so it wasn't quite as appealing to me. I really prefer the earlier series that sticks more or less to what a real kitten's life is like. There's still plenty of normal stuff in here- Chi gets repeated lessons from Blackie on how to hiss and intimidate- practicing on frogs and lizards- but she's too darn cute to make it convincing. Chi and Cocchi go wandering at night, someone gives them fish to eat, but older stray cats chase them trying to steal the food. The kittens are out on a very hot day and try desperately to find shade- sometimes in amusing places. They chase cicadas up trees and then admire the view, but are a bit scared to come down again. They're frightened by a coiled hose, thinking it a snake. At home, Chi watches her family argue and fight, and feels lonely in the empty rooms when everyone's avoiding each other- and later she helps them come together again.

The bits that stretched reality were Chi and the other kittens climbing up into the clouds (turned out to be a dream), pushing a skateboard then deliberately jumping on it for a ride, and Chi visiting the beach with the family. That part could be realistic, except Chi acted excited and curious and played with the waves more like a dog than a cat, in my opinion. I did appreciate one part that was really true to modern life- the boy Yohei busy playing video games on a device, ignoring both Chi and his dad. Dad brings out a bunch of nostalgic old-fashioned toys trying to convince Yohei to play, Chi starts joining in which finally gets the kid interested too. I liked that.

Borrowed from the public library.

Rating: 2/5           88 pages, 2017

The Martian

by Andy Weir

You've probably heard of this one. Astronaut gets stranded on Mars and has to figure out survival completely alone in a hostile environment, for over a year while he hopes for rescue. He does manage to make contact with Earth eventually, so knows when he might get rescued- and the food will run out long before it's possible. So he rigs stuff up, activates soil, reclaims more water, grows potatoes. Has lots of equipment failures or simple mistakes that throw things awry, sometimes to the point of disaster it looks like- but he always manages to squeak past death and survive another day. I thought I would enjoy this just as much, if not more, than the movie version- which I saw quite a while ago- because a lot of the science is explained here (and it's based on a lot of research, reputedly very true-to-life what that kind of situation would be like) but unfortunately the explanations mostly either went over my head or were boring, so I found I didn't get more out of it. The film was more gripping, I followed along better seeing the suspenseful moments, whereas this book doesn't really convey a lot of emotion. You hardly get to know the main character as a person. It's all about the problems he's tackling. There is some humor thrown in there- but honestly I didn't find it funny, just tiresome. Being a gardener, I was pretty interested in how he got a potato farm going on Mars to feed himself, but even that lacked the kind of description I enjoy. When the story moved on I still wanted to see how it all played out (having forgotten a lot of key points) but turns out it was fairly dull and I didn't get a sense of tension in the end, I was just turning pages to be done. So this is another case where I actually preferred the movie. That's all.

However, lots of other readers enjoyed it- see the links below.

Rating: 2/5           435 pages, 2011

more opinions:
Indextrious Reader
BookNAround
Attack of the Books!
That's What She Read
Bookalicious Babe

Last Chance Mustang

by Mitchell Bornstein

Subtitled The Story of One Horse, One Horseman, and One Final Shot at Redemption. This guy is a lawyer, but his passion on the side is working with problem horses. He takes on a project to train an adopted mustang that seemed impossibly violent and unpredictable- the horse attacked other animals and people, destroyed property, fought viciously any attempts at being handled, and constantly injured himself on fences trying to escape. He'd been caught off the range after living years of his life a free wild stallion, and was gelded at the age of twelve- which did very little to change his behavior by the way. The owner asked Bornstein to work with him as a last resort. So this book is about how the author worked through issues with the intractable horse, step by step teaching him that this one person, at least, did not mean him harm, and working to get him to accept halter and lead, bridle and eventually even a saddle. The details about methods used to approach and train the horse- readjusting its thinking from flight-or-fight to understanding and then acceptance- was fascinating and the reason I kept reading. The rest of the book- not so much. I got tired of the repetitive, flowery clichés and how the author explained himself over and over again. While the atrocities of how wild mustangs were treated by government management programs is useful and interesting information, I felt there was too much of it in this book. It did give me more detail than what I've gleaned from books like The Horse Lover or Nobody's Horses, but to the point that I started skimming a lot- rather felt those sections interrupted the story instead of enhancing it. And while I don't mind a bit of anthropomorphism- I do believe that animals have emotions- I felt this author took it too far, and I often questioned what he imagined the animals were thinking. (He also made a lot of assumptions about abuse the horse must have suffered in its past). While I enjoyed the main story, and admire the patience and perseverance this man had to work with a horse nobody else could handle, overall I was left with a feeling of unease akin to the end of reading A Dog Called Perth (but not for the same reasons).

Borrowed from the public library.

Rating: 2/5            300 pages, 2015

Dragon Champion

Age of Fire Book One
by E.E. Knight

It's a story from a dragon's perspective, and that's the main enjoyment I got out of it. The young dragon hatches in a secluded cave guarded by his parents and immediately pitches into a battle for survival- the male hatchlings fight for dominance and one ousts all others from the nest. The young dragon then grows with its sisters under the watchful eye of parents, learning dragon lore and practicing hunting skills on slugs and bats. Before he is old enough to venture into the outside world, their cave is attacked by a band of dwarves, and the dragon barely escapes with one of his siblings. He embarks on a long trek- at first attempting to return to the cave and discover what happened to his family, but then gets separated from his sibling and is just scrambling to survive. He falls in with some wolves, then gets caught by elves and escapes, then makes a deal to guard a caravan of traders, then goes on a search to find an ancient dragon who might tell him why their race is dying out. Eventually ends up in the company of humans- and part of a tangled confusing war- all the different hominids in this world (elves, dwarves, humans and creatures called blighters) are fighting each other, but one group seems to be overpowering the rest because it controls dragons to battle for them. Our dragon seeks them out, hoping to discover what enabled one man to command the dragons, but he finds much more than he'd bargained for.

Well- there's a lot I liked about this book, and a lot I didn't. I found this author's idea of dragon physiology really intriguing- especially the main character who was different from the other dragons, being born without protective scales. While others immediately saw him as a weakling or a freak, he found his own strength and was often quite clever and bold. I was just as curious as the protagonist to find out how the other dragons were being held in thrall, and the part where he infiltrates the enemy island was pretty interesting. But all the middle of the book- what a slog. It seemed that any part where the dragon was accompanying hominids got to be very dull and boring. I just did not care about their factions and battles and different cultures. The conversations are often awkward, the characters' reactions to things feel flat, and the pacing is sometimes odd. I like these dragons, but the execution felt a bit poor. In spite of that, I'm moving on to the second book in the series, there is something about the story that makes me want to find out what happens.

Oh, and if this might bother some readers- there's a lot of death. The dragon eats children, bites the head off foes, tears apart animal prey and so on. It's really quite brutal and bloody- which you'd expect from a story about the dragon's viewpoint- but also very tame for all that- the descriptions never really made me feel squeamish or horrified- just oh, so that guy lost his head too? Moving on! which was part of the disconnect I felt through the whole thing . . .

Rating: 2/5                            371 pages, 2005

The Reunion

Animorphs #30
by K.A. Applegate

Ah, this one didn't work for me. Maybe I wasn't in the right reading mood. Maybe because it's been so long since the last Animorphs read, I didn't really recall what was going on. Oddly enough, this book jumps straight into the storyline without the usual recap, but it was so awkward at first. Please note there are SPOILERS below if you haven't read this far in the series.

So Marco skips school and walks downtown, running into Visser One (his mother) in disguise, so of course he follows her and uses morphs (in a very risky way) to get into the office she 'works' at and almost gets caught but doesn't and tells the other Animorphs what he's discovered and they go back the next day as a team. The confrontation is a mess of course but they learn that Visser Three has his forces following Visser One, having convinced their council that's she's a traitor and obtained a warrant to execute her. The Animorphs see an opportunity now to do away with either one or both of the Vissers, but Marco is dealing with some serious internal conflict: protect the Visser One who is his mom as a controller, or take the opportunity to kill her, as one of their greatest enemies. Marco decides to plow ahead with a plan to trick the two Vissers into fighting with each other- and for some reason his friends go along with this. In a nutshell it entails taking Visser One up the mountain in disguise leading her to think she's going to wipe out the hidden Hork-Bajir colony meanwhile Visser Three and his forces are following behind and yes there's a showdown on a mountain top that is only partly actually there- because the Hork-Bajir valley is actually a hologram to trick Visser One- and it's Marco who attacks Visser One but Jake knocks him aside and even though she falls off the mountainside it appears she may have survived. Marco, needless to say, is a mess. He goes home and zones out in front of the television for days.

A lot of it feels infused with anger and confusion (on Marco's part). The plan was never clear to the reader, only as it unfolded. The new morph in this book was mountain goat, by the way. A lot of things are mentioned only once and briefly, then left entirely up to the reader's imagination- such as when an underling angers Visser Three who instantly chops his arm off. The limb falls to the ground, and the narrative immediately moves on to someone talking- there's no description of bleeding, or fainting, or the maimed person screaming or anything. Just oh, his arm is gone now!

Um, I'm going to read two or three more here and if I'm getting the same vibe it will be an indication to take another long break and read something different for a while. Had this one on my e-reader.

Rating: 2/5                pages, 1999

more opinions:
the Library Ladies
Snips and Snails and Puppy Dog Tales

Lone Wolf

Wolves of the Beyond
by Kathryn Lasky

Wolf pup Faolan is cast out by his pack at birth for a deformity- he has a splayed front paw with a strange mark on it. He would have died, but a grizzly bear that had just lost her cubs took him in, nursed him and taught him all she knew. When the wolf pup grows up he realizes he's not actually a bear, and sets off to find his own kind. Adventures ensue, hinting at some grand destiny for this little wolf.

I liked the beginning of this book, when the wolf was being raised by a bear. I thought the talking animals were written really well, with realistic behaviors and some interesting invented animal culture in there. The story moves pretty quick and things really change when the wolf leaves to find his own kind. He encounters savage cannibalistic wolves that live with no apparent laws, then explores a cave with depictions on the walls that teach him history (this was rather confounding, I couldn't figure out how the wolf learned to read the symbols on the wall so instantaneously), and then meets a clever metalsmithing owl. It all takes place in the same universe as the Guardians of Ga'hoole (which I haven't read, but saw the movie) I read it as a standalone but ended up it didn't really work for me. I started skimming at some point, it was feeling like a very different kind of story and some of the elements got a bit too mystical or fantastical for my suspension of disbelief. Also, it seemed really unlikely that a young, lone wolf, no matter how well-fed and taught by a bear, could kill a cougar on its own, and later take down a full grown caribou, also solo. There's lots of killing- the wolf and other characters talk about it matter-of-factly and it's not deliberately gory but might be off-putting for some kids (this is middle-grade fiction). The more spiritual elements like the wolves, bears and other animals telling things by star patterns, was a bit of a stretch for me too. Oh well. This series (and others by the same author) have lots of fans, so it's probably just me. Being too old, and too critical.

Rating: 2/5         219 pages, 2010