Ride By Night Christine Pullein-Thompson

Another entertaining read by the undeniable 'queen' of the pony books. I cannot think too many authors have had more works published than CPT (especially of this genre)?

A camping holiday in the Highlands (presumably) on ponies turns quickly in a battle against adversity to save the lives of two Romanian asylum seekers fleeing the Russian fleet. A little far fetched maybe but nether the less entertaining. However I can't help thinking it just an adaptation of her first novel We Rode To Sea. It is a long time since I read it but it also concerns a holiday in the Highlands (widely thought to be set between Fort William and Inverness) although this time it's a family rather than a group of friends and rather than being persued they end up persuing some Germans, who have two of their ponies, quite literally to the sea.

I am still mulling over the setting for this one too. Immediately Fort Augustus (Fort Angus) sprung to mind but there was a mention of it being by the sea and a beach so that cannot be. Mallaig (Collig) was also a thought and then they could have rode to Ayisaig maybe but I don't think this would provide a large enough town so I am a little perplexed. I know the sisters held great affection for Scotland and were frequent visitors so can't help thinking the town and village mentioned are real and most likely in the Highlands.

The story begins when Sheila and Desmond, who are bored and seeking some excitement, first think of organising a mounted camping expedition. Never did they imagine what drama and excitement was to follow! First the trekkers get lost, then they lose a horse and end up saving the lives of two Romanian asylum seekers, amid a barrage of gun fire, who are fleeing Russian Fleets.

In true CPT style it is quite dark in tone and not without it's casualties. One of the Romanians is shot, the children generally suffer from hunger and fatige and poor Jennifer has a nasty fall and breaks her nose. Tom Thumb, Ian's borrowed potential dressage horse, is injured but it is poor 'rich girl' Leslie, (whom turned out not to be spoilt and stuck up, as they had imagined prior to leaving, in the least) who suffered the most. Ching Poo (what a brilliant name!), her Peke, falls to his death down a prepice while escaping the Russians while her pony Raspberry also ends up becoming lame too.

Although I have pictured the the first edition with the beautiful Sheila Rose cover, I read a Pb copy which I have owned, but never before read, from childhood. I have found that there are a number Of Christine's books , which I own that fall into this category whereas I have read (and more often than not devoured) both Diana's and Josephine's books as soon as I have got my hands on them, in fact the childhood ones that escaped my mums recycling sprees were/are now rather tired and dog eared! The reason was summed up perfectly however by Jane Badger, some time ago in this excellent post on her blog, where she described some of her works as being outside her comfort zone. I had not really given the reason why, despite commercially being the most successful of the sisters, I had never liked her books as much as her sisters that much thought prior to reading this post. On reading the post it fell into place, as it was also outside my comfort zone. I didn't like the doom and casualties a lot of her books carried but also the subjects were sometimes out of the comfort zone of a pony mad youngster, after all I wanted to gallop on beaches and win rosettes and not be worrying whether I would escape from Russian Fleets!

Same Book, Different Title

Two of the offending titles

Have got this from a post about books with same titles on Jane Badger Books Forum, on replying to the initial topic It got me thinking about the times I have thought I'd discovered a new book by an author to find it was re-titled or an American title. Why do publishers do this...one suggestion was to get us to buy all the different copies to raise sales...which sounds about right to me.


It's not so bad if the change is suitable such as CPT's The Doping Affair becoming The Pony Dopers, which made sure the audience was aware it was a child's pony book. Dream of Fair Horses and it's American counterpart The Fields Of Praise are okay if you have actually read the book, on the other hand if you have you probably won't part with it for 'a quarter horse' (or your equivalent) so wouldn't be looking anyway. I have just found out Janet Young Rider aka Horse For The Holidays is also aka Last Summer To Ride, which I was rather pleased to find out about as it was in my shopping basket to purchase tonight! What either subsequent title has to do with the first is beyond me? I was also caught out by the Kestrels/Horseshoe's series. I imported the Horseshoes from USA to find I already had them as Kestrels. I should have known really as some have same title and some have very subtle differences like The Perfect horse/The Special Pony and Jumping lessons/Pony To Jump.

I admit to buying several editions of the same book, sometimes, because I like all of them and can't decide which one to have but it's so infuriating when you've spent rather too much on one to find you've had it years (and aren't that fussed about it to boot!).


Saying all this one of my favourite books is K M Peyton's Free Rein/Last Ditch. I spent far too much buying Free Rein, as I loved the cover, knowing full it was the same book I had spent a small fortune the year before as Last Ditch. But at least I knew and it wasn't a surprise. Not all suprises are good.

Random Ponies On Covers

Having just taken the below picture of the photographic cover edition of Christine Pullein-Thompson's The Horse Sale, It got me thinking about Random pictures (mainly seems to be photographs) on Pony books. I could not quite work out where this pic relates to the characters human or equine in the book, however it is a long way from the worse I thought of.

But it did get me thinking about what is going through the publishers mind at the time, I am assuming as they tend to be reprints the author has no input, even if not horsey individuals you would think they would try to match the ponies to the story at least. It is not too dissimilar to having a football pitch on the front cover of a tennis book really.

This one really has to take the Golden Carrot for worse cover.

Magic and Moonshine were grey Shetlands so how someone came up with a palomino welsh to star on the cover is anyone's guess. Maybe the guide dog chose?

And the Lions reprints of the Brumby books are not far behind as they feature Goldie, star of the Silver Brumby Movie (or should they have re-titled it The Golden Brumby?)

Elyne Mitchell was present at some of the filming and was involved with the film so clearly she gave her consent to changing the colour...I have not had chance to read my copy of the movie book yet so will have to see if an explanation is given?

There was also an illustrated edition of a pony to school featuring the rearing in front of the car episode where the pony was steele grey/black but on the whole illustrated covers tended to match the contents, maybe illustrators bothered to research the subject. There is also a line of thought that Knight changed Ruby Ferguson's Blackboy into a piebald after new illustrator Bonar Dunlop interpreted him as a piebald. So some publishers clearly considered the details of correct cover pic important.

On the other hand some did manage to get it just right! Here are Magic and Moonshine again, in an earlier re-print, and they are grey shetlands, just as described in story with handlers who could easily be Ian and Angela.

And they got it more than right for this, my favourite non illustrated cover, Welsh Tristram and Connemara Saffron along with Nettie and Alice are represented to perfection by this pair of ponies and riders. Pony Club Cup is also excellent with Alice and Saffy agin and an Asian model to play the part of Hanif. So what happened with Trek????? The bay is far too big to be the only bay pony partnered by a girl, Bowie, could be Ferdinand but then whom was the mystery rider?
Can't be Sea king and Jennifer as they did not feature after part way through Challenge.

Lot's more did get it right and the Jinny books spring to mind also making sure the model had long red hair. Shame they chose a stallion to play the mare Shantih in the 80's editions! But you can't have everything.