I love to read. Since I was a small child, it’s been one of
my passions. There’s nothing that quite compares to getting lost in a great
book. My friend and twin cities author
Brian Freeman is the king of the detective genre and writes page-turning mysteries
that contain more twists and turns than a May Township back road.
I can always count on Brian,
my longtime stalwart, Stephen King, and a few select others for an excellent
read. But discovering an extraordinary new writer is exhilarating: like
finding an agate in a gravel pile or a wild flower in a patch of weeds. A few
weeks back a friend passed along a soft cover that she had received from her
book club. At first glance, she didn’t think
much of the storyline so she asked if I wanted it. Shirley’s loss was my tremendous gain.
The book is The Hearts
of Horses by Molly Gloss and it’s set in eastern Oregon in 1917. World War I had just started and most of the
young men were overseas so women were doing jobs that had traditionally been
done by men. Enter our heroine. 19 year-old Martha Lessen is what we now know
as a horse whisperer. A tall, quiet and
dignified young woman from an abusive background she has an amazing gift: through
love and kindness she can communicate with and train even the most damaged horses. Leaving
home with her three equines—one of which had been badly burned in a barn fire—Martha
winds up in the small town of Shelby, where farmers George and Louise Bliss
convince her to stay the winter after she domesticates their broncos with soft
words and sweet songs instead of lariats and hobbles. News of this stalwart young
woman’s success soon spreads and in no time she is traveling from farm to farm in
Elwha County, or “riding the circuit” as it’s called, breaking horses.
This is the tale of Martha
and her effect on animals but it’s also about the people she meets and the
lives she changes. This novel is an incredible
slice of life from a bygone age that will engage and charm as it draws you
in. By book’s end you will truly care
about these plain, hard-working people and understand what life was like for
our forebears.
The book had special
significance for me. Martha was the same
age in time as my paternal grandmother who died in the great 1918 Spanish flu
pandemic that killed between 50 and 100 million people. I’d grown up hearing stories that Grandma
Bridget was a real pioneer for her day. I’d like to believe she had a bit of Martha in her.
As a professional writer, I’m
fussy about the tone of books. For a
period piece, I could
not have been more impressed with author Gloss’ spare yet elegant prose. She perfectly captures the difficulties and simple joys of life
before the modern era.
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| Author Molly Gloss |
The book is also a reminder
of what the world was like for animals in general around the turn of the 20th
century. Much is written today about certain
species facing extinction but, speaking generally, animals are far better off today than they
were 100 years ago. Gloss tells of how
ranchers killed everything in their quest to protect their livestock. Horses were sacrificed as “living bait’ to
draw wolves and other predators in so they could be shot. The novel also touches on the plight of
horses who were shipped overseas to participate in World War I. As illustrated in the film War Horse millions of equines were treated
horribly. The book goes on to reveal
that after honorably serving their country, most were butchered to feed
starving Europeans. It would have been
easy to paint people as villains for their disgraceful treatment of animals but
instead Gloss takes the more difficult route.
With a couple of exceptions, she shows us that most folks—overworked,
underfed and exhausted—just didn’t know any better.
The human race has far to go
but we have greatly evolved with our thinking about the animal world. Today there are laws and special interest
groups that protect all living things.
My hope is that in another 100 years we will have travelled leaps and
bounds in both our understanding of and appreciation for God’s creatures. I firmly believe that it’s thoughtful and
intelligent books like The Hearts of
Horses that will help us reach that lofty ideal.
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