Rereading: SANDY’S SPURS by Lavinia R. Davis

Davis loved horses and children, and wrote some excellent books about them. This is the last of those, and not quite as good as earlier ones, but still quite an enjoyable read. One thing I really missed was the excellent illustrations by master horse artist Paul Brown from the earlier books, the ones here are not nearly as good.

Sandy Martin can’t go for a summer vacation at the beach with his family this year. Instead he’s been invited to spend the summer with his mother’s old friend Mrs. Trowbridge and her three children at their farm in Virginia. When he arrives, Sandy doesn’t understand why the two older Trowbridge kids, Ashe and Matty, treat him with polite coldness. The youngest, Carter, is more friendly. When they arrive at the farm, Sandy is taken to see the two horses they have and ride regularly. Black Arrow is a spirited horse that Ashe rides, while Buster is a comfortable plodder. Sandy has only ridden a few times at fairs, but Ashe insists he ride Black Arrow, a brief ride that ends with a fall. Sandy is angry, and he and Ashe fight, then Sandy runs off.

Later, Sandy finds out the reason for his treatment is that his parents are paying the Trowbridges to have him, and Matty and Ashe think they have to entertain him, thus letting him ride their best horse. Eventually it all gets sorted out, and the children become friends just in time to encounter some mysteries involving an ancestor of Sandy’s mother, and a mysterious figure who drowns some woodchuck babies they wanted to raise. Are these mysteries connected, and if so, how?

A fine book. By this time, Davis was also writing adult mysteries, and that side of the book shows it, with lots of complications and a possible hidden treasure. There’s still time for riding, some horse shows, and other adventures. Recommended if you can find it.

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