Horse Country: Introduction
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Copyright © 2020 Natalie Keller Reinert All rights reserved. Cover Photo: Laila Klinsmann https://www.pexels.com/@laila-klinsmann-301011 Horse Country: Introduction One of the most common questions I receive about my writing is “which one of your series should I start with?” That’s a loaded question, because while each series is about a different aspect of equestrian life, most horse-people have an interest in more than just the discipline they ride in every day. Dressage riders can love The Eventing Series best, and trail riders might think the Show Barn Blues Series is the greatest. Plus, my characters have a tendency to wander in and out of different series. So if you find yourself in love with the character Grace in Pride, you will definitely want to read Show Barn Blues, which is her story. In my head I’ve called the Alex & Alexander, Eventing, and Show Barn Blues Series the Horse Country Collection. I’ve put together this sampler with the first few chapters from each of my series openers, so you can decide which one is right for you, right now. I’ve also included The Hidden Horses of New York and Grabbing Mane, although these books are not part of the Horse Country Collection’s shared universe. And for those who are curious about the order of all of my Florida horse novels, here is their chronological line-up: Horse Country Collection 1. The Head and Not The Heart (Alex & Alexander 1) 2. Other People’s Horses (Alex & Alexander 2) 3. Claiming Christmas (Alex & Alexander 3) 4. Turning for Home (Alex & Alexander 4) 5. Ambition* (Eventing Series 1) 6. Show Barn Blues* (Show Barn Blues 1) 7. Pride (Eventing Series 2) 8. Courage (Eventing Series 3) 9. Luck (Eventing Series 4) 10. Horses in Wonderland* (Show Barn Blues 2) 11. Forward* (Eventing Series 5) *Action occurs more or less at the same time period as the adjacent book As you can see, there’s some overlap but it isn’t too bad. Everyone is introduced properly in each novel, so there’s no requirement to read them in this order! It’s just there if you’re interested. In 2020, this collection will expand by two with the introduction of Runaway Alex, the prequel to The Head and Not The Heart, and Prospect, Book 6 of The Eventing Series. Learn more at Patreon. Ambition Ambition Introduction Ambition is my most popular novel. It’s also one of my most disliked novels. What can I say, I’m a people-pleaser. Jules most decidedly is not. Our heroine is tough, focused, and knows exactly where she wants to be — and no one is going to get in her way. The one chink in Jules Thornton’s armor is her love of her horses. Even when she’s willing to steamroll over anyone and anything standing between her and eventing glory, she does everything she can to keep her horses happy and well. Jules is hard to love, but that doesn’t stop Peter Morrison, local Hot Eventing Guy, from falling for her. There is a whole lot of storm between Jules and Pete, including one actual hurricane, but their relationship has since spawned the writing of four more novels, with Book Six on the way. If she makes you crazy in Ambition, I’ve done my job right — but hang on for Pride, Courage, Luck and Forward. Jules really does grow up… she 1 just needs a little time to get there. Chapter One Use one word to describe yourself. Dynamo leaned over the stall webbing and nudged at my shoulder. I smiled and tickled his chin whiskers, prickly where I’d let them stay a little long. I didn’t like to cut a horse’s whiskers too short; they were little antennas, keeping a horse from bumping his nose in the dark. Of course, Dynamo rarely experienced total darkness. Even when he was outside at night, there was a light burning over his paddock. I liked to be able to see him, at any time, day or night. “If I were to describe you with one word, Dyno, it would be adorable.” Dynamo retreated into the stall, clearly affronted. As well he should be, I figured—he was an athlete, he was a very manly horse. Not a kitten, but a panther. Still adorable, though, no denying it. “You two are really close,” a voice said, sounding impressed. “That’s nice.” I glanced down the stable aisle. A girl was sitting on her own tack trunk, dressed like I was in boots and breeches, polo shirt in her barn colors, hard hat at her side. The stall door next to her was closed; I saw a dark horse within, watching us through the stall bars. “He’s my baby,” I admitted reluctantly. “Doesn’t yours like to socialize?” “This princess?” The girl looked over her shoulder at the horse behind her, as if she hadn’t known the horse was lurking there. She shook her head at the mare, and the horse disappeared into the depths of the stall. “She bit me an hour ago. I’m surprised you missed that. I shouted like a little kid. So now she’s on time-out.” She considered, then got up to undo the latch. “I should probably let her apologize, since our ride time is coming up soon. Otherwise she’ll go out there swishing her tail and cranky, and we’ll have a terrible ride.” I was sorry I’d said anything. She slid the door open and leaned over the stall webbing. “Amber… come on over… come on, Amber.” The horse ignored her. The girl shook her head ruefully. “She’s never really liked me.” She watched Dynamo for a few seconds—he was rooting around in my pony-tail now, rubbing his upper lip around the elastic band. He loved to pull it down and make me look even messier than usual. “I’d love to have that kind of relationship with a horse,” she said wistfully. “We’ve been through a lot,” I replied simply, and looked the other way, out the stable doors where the green grass and black-board fences of Ocala went rolling by in gentle swells. I wasn’t here to make friends or tell my life story to nosey competitors. 2 I was here to win. *** I didn’t have enough money to be in the horse business, that was the simple truth. It didn’t matter how many people told me that showing horses was a rich man’s sport. There wasn’t anything else for me to do. There wasn’t anything else I cared about. My parents caved early and paid for riding lessons. All through elementary school and middle school, I rode once a week, bouncing around a ring for an hour on a bored school-horse, and that was supposed to be enough. When it wasn’t, I managed to find ways to work for riding lessons. My riding instructor, Laurie, knew a good thing when she saw it. I was willing to do anything at all to ride for an extra twenty minutes. Scrub out drains, clean out gutters, muck out stalls. I was child labor and I was proud of it. Working at the riding stable ate any social time I might have had, and I didn’t care. There were no parties, no dates, no prom nights. I wandered through my school years drawing windswept manes and pricked ears onto the brown paper covers of my textbooks, and, as soon as I realized no one was going to notice or care if I wasn’t sitting slumped in the back of the room, I started skipping class to strip out stalls instead. Laurie was a fantastic rider, a decent riding instructor, and a very savvy businesswoman. She dangled rides on half-broke ponies in front of me in exchange for barn chores, and I snapped up every chance to climb onto her auction finds and rodeo rejects. I didn’t have the money to ride good horses, but I was willing to risk life and limb and scholastic expulsion to get on any horse I could. And so I happily agreed to ride outrageously bad horses: horses who bucked, horses who bolted, horses who flipped over and horses who lay down in the dirt when they were tired of working. But all that badness made me a supremely confident rider, able to stay in the saddle through just about any display of dangerous behavior. My happiest hours were spent in the saddle, with brief time-outs when some auction bronc managed to get me out of it. I always got back on. Always. Laurie loved me. “I can put you on anything and in six weeks I have a lesson pony,” she’d brag when she showed me off to friends. I’d shrug and blush and go get on another horse. I didn’t know what else to do. No one else at the barn loved me, of course. I was a working-class kid in a rich kid’s world. Laurie financed her dressage and eventing career by teaching kids to ride on the auction ponies I had taught some manners, then selling their parents very expensive push-button show-horses. Osprey Ridge catered to extravagantly wealthy girls, and by the time we were teenagers together, the lines had been drawn. I was on one side, the hired help, and they were on the other, making my life difficult.