Dark Horses and Black Beauties - Melissa Holbrook Pierson

In a phenomenon too prevalent to be mere chance, little girls all over the Western world wake one day to find themselves completely taken over by the love of all things equine. Melissa Holbrook Pierson was one of those horse-crazy girls who later returned to riding with a new appreciation for the nature of horses. Melding memoir, sociology, history, anecdote, and a bit of prose poetry, Dark Horses and Black Beauties delves beneath the shallow hypotheses explaining women's connection to horses to look at how this communication with another animal opens us up to a new apprehension of the larger "natural" world.

Melissa Holbrook Pierson is the author of The Perfect Vehicle, The Place You Love Is Gone, Dark Horses and Black Beauties, and The Man Who Would Stop at Nothing and The Secret History of Kindness. She lives in Shokan, New York.

She muses to deep and lyrical effect in Dark Horses and Black Beauties…Pierson's writing is austere-a formal restraint that, given the subject, makes one think of dressage, of riding crops, leather boots, of subtle motions in the saddle.

Richard Bernstein

The archetype of the woman on a horse could very well be the female interlocutor: Pierson herself, wandering at first, then hitting her stride, then charging…I see fire coming from her sword. I don't care if she says she can't sit the trot yet. I'm climbing up behind her to see the world from there.
Sally Eckhoff

A fearless book: unflinching, honest, and kind.

So beautifully written that it instantly captivates.

As passionate as it is informative…Rich in history, romance, and charm, Pierson's devotion to horses is always engaging, and most of all, moving.
Brenda Peterson, coeditor of Intimate Nature: The Bond Between Women and Animals

Pierson's smooth writing style is well suited to her subject, containing bits of breathless enthusiasm one moment and peaceful contemplation the next.

A vivifying, mosaic-like inquiry into our ancient and complex relationship with these powerful yet vulnerable beings.