Title Black Horses for the King Series --- Author Anne McCaffrey Cover Art David Shannon Publisher Harcourt Brace & Company - 1996 First Printing Harcourt Brace & Company - 1996 Category Historical Warnings None Main Characters Galwyn Varianus, Lord Artos Main Elements King Arthur

No hoof, no horse...

In order to defeat the Saxons invading his land, Lord Artos (later known as King Arthur) needs to develop a swift, mobile cavalry, the first ever on his island. This means he must breed Libyan horses: the only ones large enough to carry his armed warriors. Unfortunately, they are dessert horses, with hooves accustomed only to hot, packed sands.

Enter Galwyn Varianus, son of a bankrupt and dishonored aristocrat, and a runaway from his tyrannical uncle's ship. With his gift for languages and his knowledge of horses, young Galwyn becomes invaluable to Lord Artos as an interpreter at the horse fairs on the Continent and, later, as the first farrier to accompany him into battle to repair and replace his horses' iron sandals.

This fast-moving historical novel by bestselling author Anne McCaffrey - the story of King Arthur as it has never been told before - is about the beginnings of the British cavalry and the shooeing of horses, as recounted by a boy growing up in exciting and perilous times.

While this is a tale of King Arthur, one that attempts to stick to real history as much as possible, it is also a novel about the origins of horseshoes. Anne McCaffrey swore she would never write an Arthurian tale, not much liking the fantasy and folklore surrounding the tale, but when she found she could follow an actual historical thread, that appealed to her much more. With is why I debated even writing a review in my fantasy site because it isn't fantasy, it is as historically accurate as one can be about something that took place fifteen-hundred or so years ago.

But, it is still part of Arthurian lore, and well, I'd say a lot of fantasy lovers also love horses, and this is a book for horse lovers too.

We don't think too much about horseshoes today, but someone had to come up with the idea, and one would expect that most people would find nailing pieces of metal to the bottom of a horse's foot would be considered bizarre. Plus, you needed to be skilled to do it right, so that was added work, after all the shoe could fall off at any time and need to be replaced. In fact a badly attached shoe is worse than none at all. But Lord Artos had no choice, for the horses he needed for his army were not used to the wet and damp British soils.

It is also a young adult novel, with our protagonist being a young boy whose father died in debt and was working for his cruel uncle on his ship. But he hated the sailor life. On the other hand he loved horses and had learned a lot about them from his father. He was also educated in many languages, again something useful when needing to deal with horse traders from around the world. With such convenient skills Lord Artos is eager to take him on, even if he still had a lot to learn about caring for horses.

There is the regular bullying expected when a nobody kid joins up with an established group, which escalates over time. And of course the horses, those gorgeous black horses. It was also nice that this young boy doesn't have some glorious destiny, he doesn't become a great warrior, he doesn't get his father's fortune restored, he was just good at what he did, he worked hard, and made a name for himself as a farrier. Sure, maybe he had a few too many convenient skills at hand, but back then, just being able to read was a big deal, it didn't really take that much to be special.

Being YA it was a short and light read, but I really enjoyed it. And interesting take on the Arthurian legend, without it being about Arthur himself, but about the horses he brought to Britain.