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Summary
Summary
An unforgettable tale of war, redemption, and a hero's journey. It is 1914, and Joey, a farm horse, is sold to the army and thrust into the midst of World War I on the Western Front. When Joey is dragged away, his heart aches for Albert, the farmer's son he is forced to leave behind.In the army the beautiful red-bay horse is trained to charge the enemy, drag heavy artillery, and carry wounded soldiers not much older than Albert off the battlefields. Amongst the clamoring of guns, and while plodding through the cold mud, Joey wonders if the war will ever end. And if it does, will he ever find Albert again? War Horse joins the Scholastic Gold line, which features award-winning and beloved novels. Includes exclusive bonus content!
Author Notes
British author Michael Morpurgo was born in St. Albans, Hertforshire in 1943. He attended the University of London and studied English and French. He became a primary school teacher in Kent for about ten years. He and his wife Clare started a charity called Farms for City Children. They currently own three farms where over 2000 children a year stay for a week and experience the countryside by taking part in purposeful farmwork.
He has published over 100 books and several screenplays. He won the 1995 Whitbread Children's Book Award for The Wreck of the Zanzibar, the 1996 Nestle Smarties Book Prize for The Butterfly Lion, and the 2000 Children's Book Award for Kensuke's Kingdom. Private Peaceful won the 2005 Red House Children's Book Award and the Blue Peter Book of the Year Award. Five of his books have been made into movies and two have been adapted for television. He was named as the third Children's Laureate in May 2003.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (5)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 4-8-World War I is described from the point of view of Joey, a handsome farm horse. When Joey is forced to leave his beloved master and serve on the Western Front, he undergoes months of grueling battlefield action. Based on fact, this moving story about the love between a horse and a young man is a sharp indictment of war. Audio version available from Scholastic. (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Horn Book Review
Joey is a fine farm horse sold for cavalry use in World War I. Through Joey's Black Beauty-esque narration, readers learn of the futility of cavalry against machine guns; the loss of Joey's companion, Topthorn; and Joey's reunion with the farm boy who loves him. At times deeply affecting, the story balances the horror with moments of respite and care. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Guardian Review
Ecstatic reports from friends who saw the stage version at the National Theatre prompted me to skip the book (it's meant for kids, after all) and wait for War Horse to transfer to the West End. But ever since I heard him read AL Kennedy's Day, I have become a loyal follower of Dan Stevens, he of the chameleon voice that makes you laugh or cry at a stroke. No need to ask what Stevens reading this heart-rending story about Joey the Devonshire farmhorse - who led a cavalry charge in Belgium in 1914, pulled gun carriages for the Germans, ran away, got trapped in no man's land and much, much more - did to me. Caption: article-audio27.3 Ecstatic reports from friends who saw the stage version at the National Theatre prompted me to skip the book (it's meant for kids, after all) and wait for War Horse to transfer to the West End. - Sue Arnold.
Kirkus Review
In effect, a horse's eye view of the First World War--heart-rending in Black Beauty tradition, anti-war like All Quiet. . . , certainly unusual and dramatic. The spirited young stallion is purchased by a Devon farmer, vicious when drunk, to thwart a despised neighbor; he is protected, however, by the farmer's gentle young son Albert, then 13, who names him Joey (to rhyme with old farm horse Zoey), tends him fondly, and trains him--""inside a week,"" after a paternal threat--to pull a plow. (""For [Zoey's] sake and for my own sake, for Albert's, too, I leaned my weight into my collar and began to pull."") Rumbles of war, then the reality: Joey is sold to the British cavalry, distraught Albert is turned away as too young, Joey acquires a new protector in Captain Nicholls and a new friend in majestic Topthorn. Following Captain Nicholls' death Joey and Topthorn are the sole horse survivors of what will be the war's last cavalry charge--clearly insane in the face of machine guns and barbed wire. Now German ""prisoners,"" they are first utilized to pull ambulance wagons (under the reluctant aegis of a German aristocrat-horselover); then, happily, put to farm work by an elderly Frenchman and his lovable granddaughter Emilie; then recalled, to haul guns, by other, sterner Germans. (Says insightful Joey: ""It was not that they were cruel men, but just that they seemed driven now by a fearful compulsion. . . . "") Staunch Topthorn dies, and Joey finds himself alone in No Man's Land, approached by a single Briton and a single German. . . who toss a coin--which comes up heads for the Briton. At the veterinary hospital, he is reunited (surprise) with Albert; then, saved by an all-hands effort from tetanus. But, incredibly, worse is still to come: at war's end, the war-veteran horses are auctioned off, and Albert and his buddies are almost outbid for Joey by the local butcher. . . when little Emilie's old farmer-grandfather steps in. . . not to rescue Joey for her but to present Joey to Albert in her memory. (That sentimental nadir is followed, fortunately, by brief word that Albert's soon-to-be-wife ""never did take to me, nor I to her."") Despite relentless English and German anti-war rumination, and Joey's own supra-equine understandings: some distinct glimpses of how it was to be a war-horse--in addition to that thundering melodrama. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Like Morpurgo's Private Peaceful (2004), this searing World War I novel reveals the unspeakable slaughter of soldiers on all sides fighting against people who are just like them. The story is told by an English farm horse, Joey, and, as in Cynthia Kadahota's Cracker! The Best Dog in Vietnam (2007), the first-person narrative blends the animal's physical experience with what men say. On the farm, Joey has close ties to Albert, who is too young to join up when his dad first sells Joey to the army. Charging into battle under machine-gun fire, Joey is captured by the Germans, who train him to haul ambulances and guns. His reunion with Albert in battle is sentimental and contrived, but the viewpoint brings close the fury of the thundering guns, the confusion, and the kindness of enemies who come together in No Man's Land to save the wounded horse. Joey's ability to understand the language wherever he is--England, France, Germany--reinforces the novel's antiwar message, and the terse details speak eloquently about peace. --Hazel Rochman Copyright 2007 Booklist
