Summary: The only one of the Narian books that is primarily focused on the people of the world where the country of Narnia is located.
Earlier in the pandemic, I had grand plans of reading to my children chapter books of my childhood every day. We read The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe and a couple of other books. But the reading came to a stop with The Horse and His Boy. My children never engaged well with the story. They were becoming bored with nightly reading. And I was losing my motivation to read while trying to manage my work from home job, managing virtual schooling of what was then a Pre-K and Kindergarten student, and trying to keep the house somewhat organized.
We finished about fifty pages last spring. Last Friday night, as the chaos of the election ensued, put down my phone and picked up my kindle, and read the last 75 pages in a single sitting. The Narnia books really are short. So many children’s books that I think of as fairly long can be read in an hour or two and really only have a couple of main plot points.
For the Horse and His Boy, the story is basically six scenes. 1) Background and introduction to Shasta (the boy). 2) The escape of the horse (Bree) and Shasta from their enslavement. 3) Finding and getting to know Hwin (another talking Horse) and Aravis (the girl). 4) Getting through the big city and the two side threads happen during that task. 5) The race through the desert and to tell the King of the secret attack. 6) Shata’s introduction to the other Narnian animals and creatures and the battle. And then there is a short conclusion.