Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Horse and Girl Meet

Before the fateful day that a ten-year-old girl named Miranda Stevens first laid eyes on the young black stallion, Sir Jet Propelled Cadillac, he was the pampered darling of Shady Hills Ranch. Not yet two years old, his training was about to begin. His speed and stamina were expected to equal or outstrip the records of his aging sire, Cadillac's Last Knight. After Sir Jet wins a few big races, his owner plans, he will be brought back to Shady Hills Ranch to take Knight's place. As a sire, Knight has brought in more money than all of Shady Hills' other race horses put together. Cassius (Cash) Taylor places a great deal of hope in young Sir Jet, whom he has carefully bred for this purpose.

A Horse and His Girl: The Chronicles of Starlight and Miranda* begins with their meeting in the field next to the school playground—a meeting in which Miranda becomes obsessed with this horse that seems to materialize right out of her dreams. When she sees him for the second time and reads the name, Sir Jet Propelled Cadillac, above the door of his stall, she exclaims, "What an ugly name for the prettiest animal on earth," and she dubs him Starlight for the single white star beneath his forelock in an otherwise field of iridescent black. She cannot resist the temptation to slip onto his back from the fence of his paddock. The events that follow change the course of Starlight's future.

Miranda and Starlight was published in 2002 and revised and reprinted again in 2003. It is the first in the series of six books that carry the reader on the roller-coaster ride through the many adventures of this horse and girl. All six books are available singly or in a packaged set at www.ravenpublishing.net and at www.amazon.com.

* An anthology of the six book Miranda and Starlight series is being put together. Its release date will be announced sometime in 2011.