When 12-year-old Cole acts out one time too many, his beleaguered mother drives him from Detroit to Philadelphia to live with the father he's never known. To Cole's astonishment, his father, Harper, turns out to be a kind of urban cowboy, living in the ghetto, where he and a group of friends keep and care for old racehorses they've saved from the slaughterhouse. The horses, in turn, are used to provide a safe zone for street kids and to teach them responsibility. Unfortunately, the land Harper and his cohorts use belongs to the city, which now wants to use it for commercial development. It may be up to Cole to save his father's program and the horse with which he himself has bonded. Based on the real-life, inner-city black horsemen of Philadelphia and New York City, Neri's story, though occasionally didactic and heavy-handed, is original in theme and inspirational in tone and content.--Cart, Michael Copyright 2010 Booklist
Gr 5-8-Cole has been skipping school so much that he might have to repeat seventh grade. His fed-up mom drives him from Detroit to North Philadelphia to live with the father he's never met. Feeling abandoned, Cole at first struggles to get along with his father. But eventually his dad's vocation as a horse-whispering cowboy-he runs a stable in the inner city, which is a safe haven for local kids-gives them a chance to connect. Cole learns the history of black horsemen and how to live the "Cowboy Way," befriending a horse of his own and joining a fight to save the stable when it's threatened by the city. This well-written book is based on a true story of urban cowboys in Philadelphia and New York. Cole's spot-on emotional insight is conveyed through believable dialogue and the well-paced plot offers information about a little-known aspect of African-American history as well as a portrait of contemporary urban stable life. Watson's illustrations punctuate the intriguing aspects of the story and make the novel more appealing.-Shawna Sherman, Hayward Public Library, CA (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Gr 5-8-Cole has been skipping school so much that he might have to repeat seventh grade. His fed-up mom drives him from Detroit to North Philadelphia to live with the father he's never met. Feeling abandoned, Cole at first struggles to get along with his father. But eventually his dad's vocation as a horse-whispering cowboy-he runs a stable in the inner city, which is a safe haven for local kids-gives them a chance to connect. Cole learns the history of black horsemen and how to live the "Cowboy Way," befriending a horse of his own and joining a fight to save the stable when it's threatened by the city. This well-written book is based on a true story of urban cowboys in Philadelphia and New York. Cole's spot-on emotional insight is conveyed through believable dialogue and the well-paced plot offers information about a little-known aspect of African-American history as well as a portrait of contemporary urban stable life. Watson's illustrations punctuate the intriguing aspects of the story and make the novel more appealing.-Shawna Sherman, Hayward Public Library, CA (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
