July 15th: Celebratration of the Horse Day: Frog

I can't say I LOVED horses when I was a kid. I was interested in riding them, not in communing with them.

However, one of my favorite books as a kid was Frog: The Horse That Knew No Master by Colonel S.P. Meek. It is out of print now and I know from direct experience that getting one of the author's other books through interlibrary loan is close to impossible.

Luckily, I own my childhood copy of Frog. It is a "taming the animal" book with a laid back hero (another one!) as the horse's rider. He is a member of the military--stationed, I believe, in Panama. And I'm sure the book has an underlying assumption of imperialism or something or other.

I honestly don't care. The individual chapters are stories about the horse and his rider rescuing people, including children, and delivering communiques and discovering a spy. The villain is a fellow officer who abuses horses--gotta hate him!--and tries to cheat in order to win a race.

If you can track the book down, I recommend it!