ANNOTATION: During 1850, in England, Pell Ridley had her future arranged. She was to marry her childhood sweetheart and have 10 children, like her mother, and work herself into the grave, living in poverty. This is the last thing that Pell ever wants to do.
JUSTIFICATION FOR NOMINATION: At first I thought the book was going to be nostalgic, full of old English language and it's terminology. Then I was surprised that the first chapters talk so much about horses and their individual breeds and qualities. Little did I know that the mundane life of Pell becomes her quest to surrey out onto a journey that women would not dare to take alone during the 1800's.
The division of class, caste, and Royalty through serfdom, where still in play in merry old England, the mother land. "Proper girls didn't declare their intention never to marry nor being out in the world on her own" (8). Women were considered property, and had no rights to own land much less livestock or inherit anything from the father, and were not considered even as valuable as a male child.
Pell's Daddy was a drunken Preacher, who had sordid affairs and bastard children with Gypsy women, besides the 10 he had with Pell's Mama. "Her Daddy's generation spawned more worthless than the last, capable of providing neither a living nor spiritual guidance, unless someone needed guiding to an Inn for those other spirits" (75).
Jack was Pells favorite horse, and she was well taught on the skills of equestrian care and riding. Seeing her mother as an old, worn-out, washer woman, impoverished with too many mouths to feed, and a drunk of a husband, Pell ran away. She did not want this life for herself, and took Jack and left at the break of dawn on her wedding day. Her scrawny, underfed, baby brother, Bean, followed after her. Bean did not speak, but her could hear.
Pells journey to find work and to be in charge of her own life, was challenged by swindlers, prostitutes, drunks, hustlers, gypsies, and men with bad intent. She survives and overcomes many harsh circumstances to near starvation and death. Pell tolerated the hardships along with being judged as a girl of ill repute, in search of a better life.
The British Church/State had a man-made belief in place that there were the deserving poor = such as the Catholic Priests and Bishops, and the undeserving poor = those born into poverty. Pell fit into the second category and stereo-type. Due to the distinction in British society and the lack of rights for women, Pell put up with abuse and extreme living conditions. Four of Pells brothers died from Typhoid fever. They had not discovered quarantining of contagious diseases during this time yet.
When Pell lost her baby brother, Bean, to the gypsy woman, Esther, who happened to be the mother of 6 more children of Pells father, she also got swindled out of her prize Arabian horse, Jack. There are some surprising results to Pells efforts and circumstances that turn into a pretty happy ending. The harsh living conditions of centuries of values carried down from medieval times, make one grateful to be living in our time today. Survival and perseverance is the name of the game in this book, loving every minute of it.
GENRE: Adventure, coming of age, Alex Award.
ANNOTATION: 
