Challenge Participant

Pages

Saturday 17 December 2011

Daisy and Dancer by Kelly McKain (Pony Camp Diaries)

Daisy and Dancer - Pony Camp Diaries Bk.12

Daisy is thrilled to be at Pony Camp, where she teams up with gorgeous pony Dancer and quickly makes friends with her room-mates, twins Rosie and Isabel. When their instructor Sally takes them to see her friend perform a daring riding display, the girls are inspired to create their own. Rosie and Isabel are keen gymnasts and come up with a complex acrobatic routine for the three to perform at Friday's barbecue party. Daisy is desperate not to let her friends down, but she struggles, especially as Dancer spooks at everything too! Can Daisy and Dancer make a brilliant partnership in time to wow the crowd? Written in diary form, this is the twelfth book in a brilliant series that is perfect for all pony-mad girls.

This book was a good read, perfect for girls with a love of horse. Daisy keeps a diary of her time at Pony Camp and describes her time during the official and unofficial activities of the week. 

I know nothing about horses and their care and training but I thought that the book included some great tips about horses and their upkeep. There was also a  sub storyline about confidence and friendship which was a great inclusion within the book. This is something which I think young girls often suffer with and it was covered in a fantastic way.

One thing I liked about the book was the pencil illustrations throughout the book, they were small inclusions within the story but they were detailed. However, I was disappointed with the cover which included a photograph, it would have been great to have a larger illustration on the cover, similar to those within the book.

I would recommend this as a great gift for a horse loving girl - I would recommend this as a book more suitable for a girl than a boy as all the characters are female and they are girly girls rather than tomboys.

Thank you to the publishers, Stripes Publishing, for sending me the book to review.