I read this because one of you recommended it, as well as her other book, The Jump-off Creek. I read both of them and appreciated them; historical fiction about strong female characters is certainly a category I gravitate to. Of the two, I liked this one best though. Thank you for the tip; I would have never known about this otherwise.

Written in 2008, Hearts of Horses is about a 19 year old who leaves an abusive home in eastern Oregon to make her own way early in 1917, just as America is getting involved in the First World War. Her skills are in training horses, and she finds work without trouble, since the men that usually do it have joined up and are at war in Europe.

We now know the term “horse whisperer,” but it wasn’t always a thing. Up until this time men generally beat horses into submission, hobbling them and bucking them until they “broke” them. During the First World War, when women began to do this job, things changed, and a more empathetic approach proved much more successful.

This main character, Martha, is a great example of this. She coos to the horses and strokes them, and they’ll cooperate in any way she wishes. It reminds me of the contrast of how most engineers in the 1980’s ran construction crews in New York City, thowing their weight around, compared with how I did it as a woman, with kind explanations, which unsurprisingly produced much more cooperative, positive results.

Anyway, the horses are not the only ones here being gentled. Martha is too. Since she is so competent in what she is doing, her new community enfolds her and nurtures her. It is lovely to see.

There is a little more disease and death described in that community than I enjoy reading, so for that reason only– although realistic I’m sure– I’ll knock this down to four stars.

However, I did delight in Martha’s quiet, subtle transformation, as well as all the unsentimental portraits of the horses she worked with. This was set in a difficult time in America, but was a comforting read about the virtues of gentleness. You too might want to spend time within these pages.