Ainslie Sheridan
Trophies
Signet, pb, 1990
Ponydom on Trophies
19 year old Diana Winston can ride, but doesn’t have the money to train or compete,
so she works at a show stable,
until the owner’s daughter, jealous of Diana, makes
her lose her job by making it look as if she injured a valuable
stallion. A stable
hand, Steve Rodriguez, is convinced of Diana’s talent; buys the stallion, heals him
and trains Diana
to ride him. She triumphs on the Grand Prix circuit; is pursued
and pursues various men and at last finds love with
a surgeon who leaves his wife
for her.
Ainslie Sheridan was born in Long Island, New York, and was horse mad pretty much from the word go. Although she didn’t have a horse of her own, she managed to learn to ride, and leased a horse called Red, owned by the family of the manager of Bethpage State Park’s grounds: at least she did until she and Red galloped across the park’s golf course. Educated at Hamilton College, she was also a keen photographer, which she carried on while she worked as an English teacher in Japan. Returning to the US, she joined the US Navy, and served in Japan, Hawaii, Boston, West Point, and Newport. She adopted a little girl, married a professor, had a son and decided it was time to stop travelling. Her first novel, Tropies, was published in 1990. To date, it is her only adult novel.
It features an Andalusian, as Ainslie herself began breeding them. After becoming interested in Natural Horsemanship after attending a John Lyons Symposium, she became interested in Natural Horsemanship, and now runs Windflower Farm on natural horsemanship principles, teaching riding and sorting out problem horses. She also works as a professional photographer, and has written a children’s horse book.
Publisher’s Weekly said of Trophies: “Gaps in logic, portrayals of women other than the heroine as shrewish, and an undercurrent of class envy and snobbery sap this debut novel. Sheridan's most plausible writing concerns horses generally and Grand Prix jumping in particular, but this is the least part of the book.” The heroine, Diana, eventually finds love with a surgeon who leaves his (infertile) wife for her. Publisher’s Weekly, said “his wife's infertility exemplifies a "perverse and destructive nature,” which sounds deeply offputting behaviour in someone presumably we are supposed to admire. Or perhaps not. I will have to read the book and find out. Ponydom certainly like the book.
Finding the book: no longer in print, it’s reasonably easy to find in the USA, but can be tricky in the UK.
Links and sources:
Biographical information on Ainslie Sheridan
Ainslie Sheridan on Foxkit Press
Bibliography -
Kaleidoscope Pony
Fox Kit Press, Acton, Massachusetts, 2006
A children’s book
Hayley has just moved from sunny California to cold New England, and finds a starving
pony in a field behind her
house. She cares for the pony, but just as he’s getting
better, she is hospitalised after an accident, temporarily
blind. A mysterious stranger
gives her a kaleidoscope with which she can see magical images of the pony.
