Review: The earl's Christmas colt
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 12 31, 2013
In 1819 Lady Arabella is 24 and unmarried, and her brother arranges a match for her.  She'll be well off and the wife of an earl, but she's never met the man. The earl needs heirs and Arabella sulks at the situation. The earl will spend Christmas with them and then they will marry.  She goes off to ride her mare, not taking an escort because she's on their own land.However her mare goes lame and Arabella leads her through rain to an inn.  She sees a man in the stable dressed informally and assumes he is the ostler but in fact he's her groom to be. Instead of going inside she gives firm directions about caring for her mare. They have not been introduced so the earl does not make himself known. Arabella realises that she can't spend the night here without a chaperone as the earl would refuse to marry her. But the rain turns to snow...I liked the fun short story and the author clearly loves horses. I just found a few words misplaced - the American author doesn't use the word ostler, going with head stable man, and while Americans use the term sorrel, this is not a British word for a horse colour - the horse is a chestnut.  She could have got around this by making the horse a bay. It should also have been made clear that the earl would find it extremely improper to speak to a lady if he had not first been formally introduced to her by a mutual acquaintance.The cover photo is beautiful, but it clearly shows a woman riding astride with a long skirt on the right side of the horse, using a Pelham bit. All are wrong.  The lady should be in a side-saddle with the skirt on the left of the horse and no stirrup on the right, as described in the book. The double bridle should be used instead of two reins on one bit. The photo is not the author's fault however, and it's still a lovely shot.