“Not just Horse,” she said. “The horse. What you have here is the greatest racing stallion in American turf history.”–Geraldine Brooks, Horse
Geraldine Brooks has crafted another winning story with this novel about an actual horse that lived and raced in the Antebellum South, became the most successful racehorse of the era, and was the progenitor of many notable racehorses including Preakness. The story of the horse is interesting, but it is the accompanying stories of the enslaved black groom who cares for the horse, an art history student who rescues a discarded painting from a junkheap and a scientist at the Smithsonian who loves bones that really bring this book to life.
The book is set during three main periods and locations–1850 Kentucky, 1954 New York, and 2019 Washington D.C. There is a lot going on but Brooks deftly weaves the three timelines together to tell a story of love, loss, art, obsession, and the racism’s role in tragedies past and present in the United States. It is also a story that holds a mirror up to our humanity, showing the good, the bad, and the ugly. With well drawn characters and a compelling narrative, this is a book that lingers long after you’ve finished reading the last page.
Content Warning: racism, some language, death, slavery, racial slurs