Horse by Leon Berger

A caleche stable in Montreal is threatened by developers, and one driver and his horse deal with the changing times.

Horse

This bittersweet chronicle about how a working horse finally gains his freedom was inspired by a real animal and true events, yet its underlying theme is about the universal value of friendship.

The hero is a sturdy draft horse: old, eccentric, and irritable. His name, suitably enough, is Groucho. By day, he hauls a tourist carriage around the heritage streets of Montreal. By night, he goes home to a stable in a run-down, working-class district.

When his owner dies, Groucho feels the loss and is helped through it by the ancient stableman, Doyle, who is also set in his ways. This is the story of how they cope with each other, as well as the threat which endangers their entire way of life.

Genre: FICTION / General

Secondary Genre: HISTORY / General

Language: English

Keywords:

Word Count: 74110

Sales info:

Horse has sold over 700 copies since publication, primarily in Canada, where the story is set. It currently holds a 4.5 rating with 4 reviews on the US Amazon site and 4.55 with 11 ratings on Goodreads. Inspired by a real horse, this novel also won the 2013 Independent Publishing Book Awards Silver Medal for Best Adult Fiction eBook.

Due to the setting of the novel and its popularity in the region, we are particularly interested in a French (Canada) translation of this title.


Sample text:

By dusk, the tourist trade had slowed, but the horse was still standing in harness, his head deep in the feed bucket. All around him, a gang of pigeons flapped and argued for the grain that spilled on the asphalt, a noisy whirlwind of activity which the big animal made an effort to tolerate—a generous gesture on his part because he didn’t seem to tolerate much else.

He was of mixed breed, a sturdy draft with American-Belgian genes and a handsome coloration, which aficionados would describe as red sorrel with flaxen mane and tail. At well over seventeen hands in height, he was easily capable of drawing the carriage to which he was attached, a four-wheeled barouche known here on the heritage streets of Montréal as a calèche. The only problem was that he was beginning to show his age. His limbs were stiffening and his coat had become slightly chafed from the constant wear of the straps. Even his character was changing. He’d always been grumpy by nature, but these days, his disposition was considerably more irritable and his temper frayed frequently. Often that’s the sign of some affliction, but after exhaustive tests, the vet had said there was nothing physically wrong with him. He’d simply turned into a senior citizen.

Behind him on the driver’s bench sat his owner, Jacqueline. She was the one who’d given him the name of Groucho. It was just a joke at first, a play on the word “grouchy” which she had blurted out once while in a drunken stupor, but somehow it stuck, mostly because it got an appreciative laugh from the paying passengers.

Jacqueline was a tough-looking woman, with a short crop of bleached hair, a broad physique, and a ruddy complexion from long exposure to a climate of wide extremes. Even today in the stiff fall breeze, she wore her regular outfit: an oversized cotton sports shirt in faded yellow, tucked into sagging cargo shorts.


Book translation status:

The book is available for translation into any language except those listed below:

LanguageStatus
French
Unavailable for translation.
Portuguese
Unavailable for translation.
Spanish
Unavailable for translation.

Would you like to translate this book? Make an offer to the Rights Holder!



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