The Ride of Her Life

Author: Elizabeth Letts
Publisher: Ballantine Books
ISBN: 0525619321
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 337

Book Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The triumphant true story of a woman who rode her horse across America in the 1950s, fulfilling her dying wish to see the Pacific Ocean, from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Perfect Horse and The Eighty-Dollar Champion “The gift Elizabeth Letts has is that she makes you feel you are the one taking this trip. This is a book we can enjoy always but especially need now.”—Elizabeth Berg, author of The Story of Arthur Truluv In 1954, sixty-three-year-old Maine farmer Annie Wilkins embarked on an impossible journey. She had no money and no family, she had just lost her farm, and her doctor had given her only two years to live. But Annie wanted to see the Pacific Ocean before she died. She ignored her doctor’s advice to move into the county charity home. Instead, she bought a cast-off brown gelding named Tarzan, donned men’s dungarees, and headed south in mid-November, hoping to beat the snow. Annie had little idea what to expect beyond her rural crossroads; she didn’t even have a map. But she did have her ex-racehorse, her faithful mutt, and her own unfailing belief that Americans would treat a stranger with kindness. Annie, Tarzan, and her dog, Depeche Toi, rode straight into a world transformed by the rapid construction of modern highways. Between 1954 and 1956, the three travelers pushed through blizzards, forded rivers, climbed mountains, and clung to the narrow shoulder as cars whipped by them at terrifying speeds. Annie rode more than four thousand miles, through America’s big cities and small towns. Along the way, she met ordinary people and celebrities—from Andrew Wyeth (who sketched Tarzan) to Art Linkletter and Groucho Marx. She received many offers—a permanent home at a riding stable in New Jersey, a job at a gas station in rural Kentucky, even a marriage proposal from a Wyoming rancher. In a decade when car ownership nearly tripled, when television’s influence was expanding fast, when homeowners began locking their doors, Annie and her four-footed companions inspired an outpouring of neighborliness in a rapidly changing world.

The Horses in My Life

Author: Monty Roberts
Publisher: Random House Canada
ISBN: 9780679313649
Category : Horses
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Book Description
The bestselling author of The Man Who Listens to Horses tells the stories of the most memorable horses he has encountered during a career of sixty years. Monty Roberts is famous the world over as "the man who listens to horses." This book is a celebration of his best-loved horses, chosen from the tens of thousands he has worked with over the past sixty years. Here he tells us of the horses who taught him the most, as well as the horses that have most indelibly impressed themselves on his memory and his heart. Monty was all but born in the saddle, a riding prodigy. Growing up, he rebelled against his father's traditionally accepted but cruel methods of "horse breaking." By observing wild horses and perfecting his understanding of the way they communicate, he was able to create a unique partnership with these noble creatures. All of the horses featured here -- from Ginger, the retired ranch horse, to world-famous thoroughbreds -- have contributed something unique to Monty's understanding of their kind. He has never lost sight of how much they meant to him, and The Horses in My Life is his tribute to their memory. "In the life of every horseman there can only be one first horse. In my case, his name was Ginger. He was around thirteen years old when I met him; and I was two. I like to imagine our first meeting, myself an infant, not in any sense aware of what life had in store, while he was a true old professional. My first experiences with Ginger began before my conscious memory, which means my life with horses has no discernible beginning." --excerpt from The Horses in My Life

The Horses of My Life - Richard Dunwoody

Author: Richard Dunwoody
Publisher: Kings Road Publishing
ISBN: 1784184608
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 300

Book Description
Richard Dunwoody was the most successful steeplechase jockey of his time. During his fantastic career, he rode over 10,000 times, often partnering the top National Hunt horses such as Desert Orchid and Miinnehoma. His staggering collection of 1,699 wins in Britain has earned him professional respect and a string of accolades including an MBE.In this fascinating book, Dunwoody remembers the great horses he has ridden and the high points of his remarkable career. In 1986 he rode to victory in the Grand National on West Tip and repeated this triumph in 1994 on Miinnehoma. It was with One Man that he won two consecutive King George VI chases. Although his career was full of memorable partnerships and victories, it is for riding Desert Orchid that Dunwoody is best remembered. 'Dessie' was a hugely popular horse - apart from Red Rum, he was the only racehorse with a fan club - and the pair rode their way to a remarkable seven victories. Yet despite his big race victories, his determination and ambition remained constant, driving him on to even greater achievements.In a book full of stories, anecdotes and opinions, Richard tells not only of the glory surrounding his career but also of the hard work involved in achieving that glory: the struggle to ensure that both horse and rider were at their peak on race day; the pitfalls and the setbacks endured; and the quirks and characteristics of some of the finest horses in this tough sport.

Riding Home

Author: Tim Hayes
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1250033527
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 267

Book Description
Riding Home:The Power of Horses to Heal, Horse Nation's must read book of 2016, is the first and only book to scientifically and experientially explain why horses have the extraordinary ability to emotionally transform the lives of thousands of men, women and children, whether they are horse lovers, or suffering from deep psychological wounds. It is a book for anyone who wants to experience the joy, wonder, self-awareness and peace of mind that comes from creating a horse/human relationship, and it puts forth and clarifies the principles of today's Natural Horsemanship (or what was once referred to as "Horse Whispering") Everyone knows someone who needs help: a husband, a wife, a partner, a child, a friend, a troubled teenager, a war veteran with PTSD, someone with autism, an addiction, anyone in emotional pain or who has lost their way. Riding Home provides riveting examples of how Equine Therapy has become one of today's most effective cutting-edge methods of healing. Horses help us discover hidden parts of ourselves, whether we're seven or seventy. They model relationships that demonstrate acceptance, kindness, honesty, tolerance, patience, justice, compassion, and forgiveness. Horses cause all of us to become better people, better parents, better partners, and better friends. A horse can be our greatest teacher, for horses have no egos, they never lie, they're never wrong and they manifest unparalleled compassion. It is this amazing power of horses to heal and teach us about ourselves that is accessible to anyone and found in the pages of Tim Hayes's Riding Home. The information and lists of therapeutic and non-therapeutic equine programs, which are contained in the book, are also available at the book's website.

The Truth about Horses, Friends, & My Life as a Coward

Author: Sarah P. Gibson
Publisher: Marshall Cavendish
ISBN: 9780761454595
Category : Juvenile Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 164

Book Description
A hilarious first-person novel about growing up with horses

Everything I Know About Life I Learned From My Horse

Author: Gwen Petersen
Publisher: Voyageur Press (MN)
ISBN: 9780760336908
Category : Pets
Languages : en
Pages : 228

Book Description
Presents humorous descriptions about how to buy a horse, learn to ride, and feed and care for it, along with anecdotal stories about horsemanship and horses from the past.

Lead with Your Heart . . . Lessons from a Life with Horses

Author: Allan J. Hamilton MD
Publisher: Storey Publishing, LLC
ISBN: 1612127355
Category : Pets
Languages : en
Pages : 233

Book Description
2016 Foreword INDIES Gold Award Winner 2016 Gold Nautilus Book Award Winner 2017 Silver Independent Publisher Book Award Winner 2017 Silver IBPA Benjamin Franklin Award Winner Award-winning author and celebrated neurosurgeon Allan J. Hamilton combines his understanding of the human brain with nearly 30 years’ experience training horses to offer wisdom on such universal themes as leadership, motivation, ambition, and humility. The results are showcased in more than 100 thoughtful essays that treat working with horses as a metaphor for personal, professional, and spiritual growth. Whether you’re searching for greater spiritual depth or simply want to better understand your four-legged partner, this wise and important collection has something for you.

From My Hands to Yours

Author: Monty Roberts
Publisher: Monty and Pat Roberts
ISBN:
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 256

Book Description
Here at last is the book horse lovers have long awaited - a thorough collection of the training techniques and philosophies of Monty Roberts.

Land of the Horses

Author: Chris Lombard
Publisher: Trafalgar Square Books
ISBN: 1646010965
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 214

Book Description
An intensely moving memoir of a young man who left heartbreak in Maine to seek healing Out West in the company of horses. Growing up in a small Maine town, Chris Lombard had never ridden a horse—never even touched one. But on one fateful night, as what he’d thought was a happy twenty-something life full of love and possibility fell suddenly apart, he met two horses and looked into their eyes. What he saw inspired him to leave everything he had, and everything he didn’t have, behind, and go in search of what was missing. With the little he needed packed in his ten-year-old Pontiac Grand Prix, and little more to go on than a belief that someone would give him a chance, Chris headed west to find work on a horse ranch. His journey took him first to the mountains of Colorado, then the Hollywood Hills of California, and finally, the wild borderlands of Southern Arizona. The settings changed but the same lessons came in quiet moments, movingly captured in these pages: watching horses, reaching out to them, swinging upon their backs. Chris learned new meanings for words—presence, connection, softness, and balance—the elements of good horsemanship feeding a deep hunger he didn’t know he had. But learning to ride a horse, learning to communicate with him, to teach him things, these required qualities Chris was only beginning to cultivate. Human nature plans; it pushes and it rushes. And it would take a terrible accident to awaken a whole new awareness for time and space, and Chris's place within it, beside a horse. In the austere beauty of the Sonora Desert, Chris met a cowboy whose intense love for life on the back of a horse held a deep sadness at bay, but only for so long. Their brief time together, working land and livestock, would bring Chris to the realization that the richly fulfilling new life he’d found held all the answers he sought, but only if he could ultimately leave it behind. Evocatively written, interweaving the author’s growing understanding of horses and how we connect with them with his deeply personal experiences, Land of the Horses brings to life a young man’s transformation alongside the horses, people, and dramatic landscapes of the American West. Healing heartbreak, falling and getting back on, searching for something true—this is a story that is in all of us. And it shows we are all capable of creating the life we truly want to live.

Horse Crazy

Author: Sarah Maslin Nir
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501196251
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 304

Book Description
There are over seven million horses in America -- even more than when they were the only means of transportation. Nir began riding horses when she was just two years old and hasn't stopped since. This is her funny, moving love letter to these graceful animals and the people who are obsessed with them. She takes us into the lesser-known corners of the riding world and profiles some of its most captivating figures, and speaks candidly of how horses have helped her overcome heartbreak and loss.