All the Kings Horses Book

All the King's Horses follows Colin and Sarah's attempts to cure their grandfather, who is becoming more and more ill with senile dementia. The story is set in Massachusetts in the 1950s, but also in "Faerie", the world of Irish myth and magic that is conjured up by Sarah and Colin's grandfather's stories. Stevenson attempts to tie together three threads for her readers through her tale--love of horses, fantasy adventure and coming to terms with illness and old age of a relative. The children's grandfather is an Irish immigrant who did well for himself as one of the best horse-trainers in the US. He has passed on this love and talent to his grandchildren, and every summer they used to stay with him and ride every day. However, for the past two years he's been unwell, and not himself--forgetting things, unable to properly look after himself--and so his daughter (their mother) gives up work to look after him. Sarah and Colin, however, do not believe what the doctors say, and are convinced that in some way their "real" grandpa will return to them. This belief is made all the more real to them when they stumble into "Faerie", with the horses, faeries and lords who are familiar to them from Irish legends. With the help of these characters, the children revisit the land a number of times on a quest to find their grandfather. These episodes can seem somewhat abrupt and don't always work their way seamlessly into the plot, but do offer readers a chance to dream beyond their everyday horizons and give a sense of life beyond school and home. Laura Stevenson sensitively tackles the grandfather's dementia, and offers a chance for children to imagine a world beyond death and illness. However, although 10-year-old Colin's certainty that his Grandpa isn't ill, he's just been "swapped" and is inhabiting a different world, could be reassuring for children, its allegorical sense is not made entirely clear, blurring the boundaries between fantasy and reality. "All the King's Horses" is therefore an appropriate read for those children who are still in the throes of make-believe, and should not be missed by any horse-mad pre-teens. --Olivia DickinsonRead More