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The Island Horse Reviewed By John Cowans of Bookpleasures.com
- By John Cowans
- Published March 31, 2012
- Childrens & Young Adults
John Cowans
Reviewer John Cowans: John lives in
retirement in Chester, NS ,where he has been an Instructor with
Seniors College Association of Nova Scotia.
He is currently working on a personal memoir, Other People’s Children, and his first poetry collection, Hope.
View all articles by John Cowans
Follow Here To Purchase The Island Horse
Author: Susan Hughes
Illustrator: Alicia Quist,
Publisher: Kids Can Press Ltd., Toronto, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-55453-592-7
With the publication of Black Beauty in 1877, the
British author Anna Sewell began what is now known as the ‘pony
book’ genre of children’s literature. With fifty million copies
sold, Black Beauty is one of the best selling books of all
time.[2] While forthrightly teaching animal welfare, it also teaches
how to treat people with kindness, sympathy, and respect. But Sewell
did not write the novel for children. She said that her purpose in
writing the novel was "to induce kindness, sympathy, and an
understanding treatment of horses." The Island Horse by Susan
Hughes is an excellent addition to this literary genre.
Susan
Hughes, who lives in Toronto, Canada, is an award-winning author,
whose books for children include Case Closed?, No Girls Allowed,
Earth to Audrey and Virginia. She has loved horses since she was a
child and has long dreamed of setting a story on Sable Island
Sable
Island, the setting for The Island Horse, is a small Atlantic island
situated 300 km southeast of the Canadian port of Halifax, Nova
Scotia. It is a year-round home to less than a dozen people,
principally scientists. Notable for its Sable Island ponies, the
island has recently been recognized as a National Park of Canada.
Prior to 1801, the island was inhabited sporadically by sealers,
shipwreck survivors, and salvagers known as wreckers. A life-saving
station was established on Sable Island by the government of Nova
Scotia in 1801 and its crew became the first permanent inhabitants of
the island. The island is home to over 400 free-roaming Sable Island
ponies who are said to be descended from horses confiscated from the
Acadians during the Great Expulsion. In the past, excess horses were
often rounded up and shipped off the island and sold to be used in
the coal mines of Cape Breton Island. In 1960 the Canadian government
gave the horse population full protection from human
interference.
The Island Horse is the story of a ten year old girl
named Ellie, whose mother has recently died, and who, early in the
19th century accompanies her father to his new job as a member of a
life-saving crew on Sable Island. Ellie is not happy because she has
to leave the Nova Scotia village and the school that she knows and
loves and she has to leave her best friend, Lizzie; most importantly
she has to leave the place where her beloved mother is buried.
Arriving on Sable Island, Ellie continues to grieve for what she has
lost, rather than rejoice in what she has gained - a new little
island home, the closeness of the sea, even the chance of a new
friend. All this make little difference to her at first, but Ellie
has always loved horses and when she makes a chance encounter with an
Island stallion, her life is changed for ever.
The Island Horse
is a beautifully published chapter book which will have great appeal
especially to 7-10 year old girls. The carefully worded story is
enhanced by the superb drawings of Alicia Quist, a self-taught artist
from Peterborough, Ontario now living in High River, Alberta.
Drawing and painting for as long as she can remember,
Alicia’s favorite subject has always been animals; but her real
love is horses as is evident here. Beginning readers will find this
book a happy challenge; however, it also is most suitable for those
who enjoy reading stories aloud.