Crystal's Rodeo Debut

Crystal Blake #3

by Stephen Bly, Janet Chester Bly

Crystal's first week in her new home in Winchester, Idaho, proves exciting as she tries out for the high school rodeo team and together with some new friends finds a lost treasure.

140 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 1986

About the author

Stephen Bly (August 17, 1944 - June 9, 2011) authored 100 books and hundreds of articles. His book, THE LONG TRAIL HOME, (Broadman & Holman), won the prestigious 2002 CHRISTY AWARD for excellence in Christian fiction in the category western novel. Three other books, PICTURE ROCK (Crossway Books), THE OUTLAW'S TWIN SISTER (Crossway Books), and LAST OF THE TEXAS CAMP (Broadman & Holman), were Christy Award finalists. He spoke at colleges, churches, camps and conferences across the U.S. and Canada. He was the pastor of Winchester Community Church, and served as mayor of Winchester, Idaho (2000-2007). He spoke on numerous television and radio programs, including Dr. James Dobson's Focus on the Family. He was an Active Member of the Western Writers of America. Steve graduated summa cum laude in Philosophy from Fresno State University and received a M.Div from Fuller Theological Seminary. The Blys have three sons: Russell (married to Lois) and father of Zachary and Miranda (married to Chris Ross) and mother of Alayah, Michael (married to Michelle), and Aaron (married to Rina Joye) and father of Keaton and Deckard. A third generation westerner, Steve spent his early years working on ranches and farms.

Reviews

[MC · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the third book of the Crystal Blake Series, Crystal's Rodeo Debut, the titular character is entering a rodeo contest in the area to which her family is moving. She wants to “test her mettle” if you will, and see if she might be able to compete in rodeos someday. She has some hiccups, but does well, though she is unable to win due to some technical problems.

Crystal gets great news from her father. In the stands at the rodeo, where he was watching the performance of his daughter and the other entrants, Mr. Blake met a man who was looking to give up a nice home that he and his wife never really use very much. The timing appears to be God's will, and so they look at the home, discovering that they love it. Matthew Blake and his daughter give the good news and reports to the rest of the family, and they decide to stay in Idaho then, instead of moving there later in the school year. Crystal and her father make the final arrangements while Crystal's mother, Catharine, older sister Karla, and baby sister Allyson, fly in from California to start moving in.

Crystal and her sister Karla start school at Highland High, where Karla will be a Senior, and Crystal a Freshman. This is terrific for both, as Karla's disappointments in the previous book make her yearn for a smaller setting and less hectic circumstances. Meanwhile, Crystal is thrilled to be able to try out for a high school rodeo team, ride her horse, Caleb, more often, and spend time with her new friend, and the guy she has a huge crush on, Shawn Sorenson. She also makes some new friends at the high school, and it is certainly fun to watch her “fish out of water” situation given her different outlook from growing up in California.

There is a mystery, or regular storyline, of sorts outside of the “meta” narrative of the series as a whole, but it isn't important here, and it is really hard to describe without giving the whole story away. It is brief and seems to be included for the express purpose of just giving the characters something else to do to keep the reader from being perhaps bored by the domestic stories.

Curiously, whereas in the immediately preceding book, this worked to some bad effect, and hurt the story, here it has the opposite effect. Part of the reason for this may be that the domestic and high school stories were actually interesting by themselves, and not just done to “move the plot along”, as seemed to be the case in the previous novel.

The most interesting part of Crystal's story here was watching her struggle with the very real problem of how to talk to an unsaved friend about the Lord. How does one do that if they aren't used to doing so? Or they aren't used to speaking? Or are shy? That is something that I myself have struggled with, and I know most Christians have.

The story wasn't compelling or at all high literature. It was a fun, quick read of an entry in a story that has lessons for everyone. It's certainly worth reading, even for those who normally don't like “kid's books”.

Recommended.

[K · Rating 3 out of 5]

Much more enjoyable, and more like the books I remember. Whether that's because I got used to the style again or because it was better written as the series went on, I don't know. (Or maybe Janet Bly, who cowrote with Stephen Bly, took over more of the writing? Always possible.) They're still not amazing books, and it doesn't seem like I missed much by not reading these two. Honestly, my favorite part of this series was always the cover illustrations with the horses, particularly Crystal's Grand Entry. Caleb is one pretty grey Appaloosa.

I probably won't keep the series, but I'll need to reread the others before deciding for sure. I wish I'd had this site as a kid, or that I'd written mini book reviews as I read back then, since impressions of books absolutely change over time and with age. These just aren't ones that really hold up. Everything is too...easy.

Crystal's dad, a writer, somehow has enough disposable income to spend a weekend deciding to move to Idaho then buying a house, without his wife even needing to come take a look at it first. Then he buys last minute plane tickets to ship the rest of the family out, with Crystal and her older sister starting school the next day, and with him flying back to LA to put his house on the market and fill up a moving truck.

Karla Blake makes class cheerleader and immediately gets a boyfriend, Crystal makes the rodeo team and gets a semi-boyfriend and two new best friends, and even though she's only been riding her (free!) horse for about a week, she's able to keep up with teenagers who've been on horseback since they were toddlers.

Then Crystal finds an old book with a description of some old journals that have a map to a treasure site, and in a single day of searching, she and her friends dig up the journals, then in another day of searching, they stumble across some treasure. It's typical middle grade hijinks wrapped up in 130 pages, but my goodness does it all feel ridiculous and rushed.

I'm a bit surprised there were only six books in this series; especially with the simple plot points and two authors working on them, these must've been pretty fast to churn out. I'm guessing they wrote other series, but I don't have enough nostalgia spurring me to check those out.