Little Black Goes to the Circus

Category:Candidates for deletion
Little Black Goes to the Circus is a 1963 Beginner Book written by Walter Farley, the author of the Black Stallion series. Illustrated by James Schucker.
== Story ==
The story begins with an unnamed boy (as the narrative character) and his black horse, which he names Little Black, hence the color. Little Black can do tricks, such as opening a gate and jumping over things. When Little Black is tired of tricks, the boy gets on his back and they go for rides.
One day, Little Black and his owner go for a long ride, when suddenly they see a sign, reading "COMING: BRUNO'S CIRCUS", which leads to the circus coming to town. Little Black and his owner come across a circus tent, where the circus workers are busy preparing for circus acts. The ringmaster, Mr. Bruno, teaches tricks to circus animals. Little Black sees a circus horse stand up on two feet, which makes him feel like doing the same, but then he falls. Everyone laughs, while Mr. Bruno thinks Little Black isn't a good circus horse.
Little Black's head and tail is down as he leaves. His owner comforts him, saying Mr. Bruno doesn't know a good horse when he sees one. Then, the boy decides to have a circus of his own with Little Black. But later, Little Black decides to run off back to the circus, only to be chased by his owner, trying to get him to stop. People watch as Little Black walk across a plank. They don't laugh this time, but they like it. Mr. Bruno realizes that he was wrong about Little Black, but considers him a good circus horse.
Next, Mr. Bruno decides to have Little Black walk across a high plank. The boy is worried that his horse will fall, but a safety belt holds him in case something happens. If Little Black does fall, the safety belt workers pull him back up to the plank. Little Black makes it across the plank, but the act isn't over. Mr. Bruno asks Little Black to walk back across without the safety belt. The boy counts on his horse to walk back across without stopping. The moment he makes it back at the start, he happily stands on two feet, as he did before. Everyone likes him, and Mr. Bruno decides to make Little Black the star of the circus.
Outside, Little Black's owner is moping and pondering. He doesn't want to let his horse go, but he wants to make him happy. Then, Little Black runs out of the tent. The boy assumes he no longer wants to be a circus star and likes his owner better. It's hard to tell who was happier - Little Black or his owner.
== Trivia ==
* Early prints of the book have a "197 Word Vocabulary" tag on the cover. This makes it only Beginner Book in which the number on the "# Word Vocabulary" is not a multiple of 25 or 50.