The Horse and His Boy
Ratings443
Average rating3.8
Summary: The fifth Chronicles of Narnia book to be published, this book tells the story of Shasta and Avaris’s travels on their talking horses and role they find themselves playing in a conflict between Archenland and Narnia and the opposing Calormenes.
Re-read of a childhood favorite. There has been talk of new Narnia movies directed for Netflix by Greta Gerwig .... A possible choice being this volume of the Narnia Chronicles ❤️
This is not my favorite of the Chronicles of Narnia books. Interestingly, I think it is better developed than the previous ones I've read, but I don't really find Shasta to be a compelling character.
Two runaways travel together to escape troubles in their lives. They join with talking horses and discover a plot to go to war with Narnia, and they race to expose the plot before it is too late.
This book has never been my favourite installment. However, I love, love the dynamic between Shasta and Aravis and the writing style/ use of words. It's beautiful. The setting is good. I liked the desert vibe this book gave me. It's quite dark for a middle grade book, since it can be a bit graphic (especially during battles), but it still is a good book for their ages. This is the first installment where I never can fully immerse myself in the story in contrary to the other installments in which I am always fully immersed in the stories. (maybe it has to do with my feelings of nostalgia, since I only read a few installments when I was young).
My son loves reading these books together. I find them fascinating to reread from the perspective of more deeply understanding Christianity than I did when I was a kid, and also from the perspective of the hero's journey.
This book definitely feels the most latently Christian to me, with lots of similar feeling to the “footprints” poem so often on the walls of Christian homes. That said, it also felt the most typical in terms of a heroic plot.
It has some racist tones as expected since the book was originally published in the 1950s. Overall, it wasn't that bad, and I'm glad it had the Pevensies in the book during their reign.
I found this story a little hard to get into. Not sure if it's because you don't read much about Peter, Susan, Edmond and Lucy who you got to know so well in the last book!
I'm not sure why I didn't review this the first time I read it. I'm not going to do a proper review since I haven't with the rest of the series, but I'll at least put a note or two.
This is definitely my least favorite book from the Narnia series. I don't dislike it, but it is quite slow and often boring. There are parts I love, which is why I'm going with four stars (though initially I had rated it five stars... I'm not sure why). I do adore this universe and it's the first fantasy series that I've wanted to get lost in, this one just drags so much.
El relato avanza un poco lento y es diferente a los actuales, pero sigue siendo hermoso. Se gasta mucho en la descripción, pero la historia en sí es buena.
While it is impossible for me to pick my favorite Chronicle of Narnia, this one is easily my least favorite of them. It's a decent story. I'm sure I enjoyed it even more when I was reading it as a child. But it just doesn't do for me what the other ones do. It doesn't have a passage that I think of often or a line I quote. But, my least favorite Chronicle of Nania is still a tale of Narnia, and therefore, well worth reading and re-reading.
One thing that I noticed this time around (1/14/22) was when Shasta was talking about being drawn to the North, always wanting to go north. Lewis had a deep love of “northernness” (He was obsessed with the Norse myths and often talked about longing for that sense of northernness when talking about sehnsucht/joy/longing.
Things I do like about this one: Aravis, the talking horses, and of course, Aslan.
The Chronicles of Narnia ranked from my favorite to my least favorite:
1. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (kind of tied with the ending of The Last Battle, but also that one scene from The Silver Chair... oh dear, I really can't choose! It's whichever of these I'm reading at the moment (to steal Douglas Gresham's answer!)
1. The Last Battle (for the ending)
1. The Silver Chair
2. The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe (kind of tied with The Magician's Nephew...)
2. The Magician's Nephew
6. Prince Caspian
7. The Horse and His Boy
Berbeda dgn buku2 terdahulu, di buku bertempat seluruhnya di Narnia, tanpa portal ajaib atau perjalanan antar dunia. Spt review buku sblmnya, rasanya kok kurang gmn gitu tanpa cerita kakak beradik Pavensie. Karena ini masuk kategori children book pastinya berkahir dgn happily ever after.
3.5 stars, wish that was an option here. Rereading the Chronicles of Narnia has been interesting. My opinions are changing so greatly of each book! I really disliked this installment in the series as a kid, but I enjoyed it so much better now! There were some issues I mentioned earlier. I have mixed feelings about how the Calormen people were written, especially at the beginning of the book.
However, as far as story elements go, I love how you can see C.S. Lewis mature as a writer here! The characters are much more well rounded. They feel like real people. Even Susan, Edmund and Lucy who make a reappearance in this one are much more fleshed out as characters.
Tonally, this book really feels like it is meant for older readers than the previous 2. It's sort of a huge leap forward in language level, even though Prince Caspian that follows it is not. In that way, it feels a little out of place in the middle of the series.
The first half especially I had mixed feelings about, but the second half of the book I loved. Very well done.
2020 reading:
Summary: The only one of the Narian books that is primarily focused on the people of the world where the country of Narnia is located.
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Not the greatest book in “The Chronicles of Narnia”, but still worth reading to my son.
The Chronicles of Narnia series was another one of my likable books reading growing up. I read through this entire series in one month and definitely liked it. There were many things that definitely dragged on about these but overall I liked it but wouldn't say I'm a die hard fan.