Hold on to Your Horses by Sandra Tayler
I’ve always had a soft spot for beautifully illustrated children’s books. I adored Mercer Mayer’s Professor Wormbog and the Search for the Zimparumpazoo. I fell in love with David Wiesner’s Tuesday, and from the first moment I saw Dinotopia, I knew I would someday own a copy. The combination of words and pictures to tell a story more powerful than either could tell alone is, in my opinion, one of the greatest accomplishments of storytelling.
Enter Angela Call and Sandra Tayler, who joined forces a few years ago to create a picture book every bit as delightful as the ones I’ve treasured since childhood. Hold on to Your Horses tells the story of Amy, an impatient and innovative child whose great ideas get her into a lot of trouble. I loved Amy’s story. I love the little illustrations with dancing horses and footprints running across the ceiling. I love the tender words and artful rendering of Amy’s late-night cuddles with her mother, and the strength of the metaphor that permeates the final pages. Hold on to Your Horses is a fabulous book.
I am, admittedly, not unbiased in my assessment. Sandra is my sister, and it’s utterly unsurprising that the story she told and the artist she selected are a perfect match for my sensibilities. Fortunately, Jim Hines and Booking Mama have no such predispositions. Neither do my children, who insisted on at least five or six repetitions before I had a chance to mention it was written by their aunt. I’m not sure they’ve really even processed the ‘aunt’ part. But they sure do like the book.
Hold on to Your Horses can be bought at the Schlock Mercenary store or at Amazon.com, and an author-approved free copy is available in PDF format. (Hint: it makes a great holiday gift.)
And, because Sandra is my sister, I’m going to include a MAJOR SHOUT-OUT to the STRENGTH OF WILD HORSES KICKSTARTER. Amy’s story isn’t finished. In the next book, she learns what idea horses are good for, and how to steer them to even more amazing places.
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cross-posted from nancyfulda.com
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