The Whole Sky
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- £8.49
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- £8.49
Publisher Description
When a devastating sickness spreads through a thoroughbred farm community, a young horse whisperer is determined to find out why all the foals are dying in this tightly woven, tender coming-of-age novel from award-winning author Heather Henson.
Twelve-year-old Sky and her father are horse whisperers—their preternatural tenderness and understanding of horses, and Sky’s uncanny ability to actually understand what they’re saying, become their livelihood during the foaling season at multimillion dollar horse farms. They’re sought after by the most prestigious farms in the country to keep pregnant horses calm and stress-free until they give birth. But this spring, something awful is happening…foal after foal is a stillborn, and no one knows why. And worse for Sky, who lost her mother only months earlier, her most beloved horse is about to have her first foal. In agony, Sky takes it upon herself to figure out what the vets are missing, and stop it before even more foals are lost.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Twelve-year-old Sky has spent her life working with horses, helping her father, who has passed on a special gift to her: both can speak to horses. When they arrive at Shaughnessy Farms to help birth this year's foals, both father and daughter are mourning the recent death of Sky's mother. Homeschooled Sky rarely spends time with kids her age, but she befriends Archie, grandson of the farm's kindly owners. Then the foals are almost all stillborn for reasons no one understands, and Sky's father, who has started drinking, disappears. As Sky attempts to discover what is killing the foals, Henson (Dream of Night) brings readers deep into the world of Kentucky horse farms, smoothly weaving in details about Sky and her father's work. Sky's grief is palpable, and her slow-building friendship with Archie is moving, as is Sky's growing understanding of his flaws and struggle to love him in the face of that humanity. But the heart of the story is Sky's preternatural bond with the animals she loves. Ages 10 12.
