Customer Reviews

If Wishes Were Horses: A Novel

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

Wyatt Blaine is a rich lawyer-cowboy with a to-die-for body, an enormous horse ranch near Boca Raton, a fabulous personality, and endless finances. And, he's single. But bad news, he's still mourning the tragic death of his wife and son - on his birthday no less, sent out on a meaningless errand - in an automobile accident involving a drunk driver - 5 years ago.

But - amazingly - Gabrielle, the widow of that drunk driver, is also still single, gorgeous, poor but noble, and she has a troubled son who her priest - fully knowing the history - suggests for the horse therapy program run by Wyatt Blaine at his ranch.

Oddly, during the first conversation with the priest ( who seems a good guy, and a nice minor character), it seems the author is trying to keep us in suspense about the shared history between Gabrielle and Wyatt. The connection was obvious to me, but the longer the scene went, the more I wondered if the author was pretending the characters didn't know. It was just strange.

I wanted to like this novel. And I hoped it would be about horses, but it's not, really. There are horses on the ranch, prized horses, but the author doesn't quite have the details right in places. I was surprised to feel it read more like a romance type novel, though there is no explicit activity.

The conflicts don't always ring true. Gabby is not sure she can ever forgive Wyatt when she falls off one of his horses. The huge family secret of the Blaine family seems medically improbable. There is a rain of tragedy at the end that took the novel from fluffy romance with knight and shining armor to a lead weight. And still, the author teases by not quite describing what happened to who for many pages, for no good reason. We know we're mourning, but we have to wait for the next chapter set months later to find out for what.

It's not really bad, and I didn't hate it. But, it didn't quite find its genre.

This was a very nice gentle story to read when you need to relax. You know from the very beginning the outcome of the book so you aren't waiting with baited breath for the ending. If you have had a long exhausting day and want to read something that helps calm you down enough for a goods night's sleep, then this is a book for you. It is well written, but entirely predictable, but sometimes you need that! For the type of book it is, it is great. Not great literature, but a great book in it's own class.

I have always loved Nicolas Spark's books and this book surely reminded me of his writing. I throughly enjoyed it, an easy, feel good read. If you like Spark's you will like this book.

There are some topics on which I would happily read just about any novel. One is the "Horse Whisperer" genre where troubled people grow and heal by caring for horses, and this book seemed to fit the bill. I was further encouraged by the letter by the publisher's vice president in the front of the book which said her reaction upon receiving the manuscript of "If Wishes Were Horses," was "This is it!"

Unfortunately, as a reader, I had quite the opposite reaction.

The plot concerns a widower whose family died tragically at the hands of a drunk driver, and who is continuing his late wife's equine therapy program at their expansive family Quarter Horse ranch. Unfortunately, one of the newly enrolled troubled teens in the program is the son of the person responsible for the widower's tragedy.

The book had a few twists at the start I found clever, such as having the teen in question be a James Dean fan, and a description of going alligator hunting, which I'd never seen in a book like this before. However, unconvincing dialogue that fluctuated between overly formal and overly casual; many exclamation points; and an abundance of cliches, soon dashed my hopes. I don't mean cliched characters or situations, so much as actual cliches, which appeared every few pages with monotonous regularity. These were, as the writer might describe it, the nails in the coffin.

Wish I had read all of the reviews before I bought this book! The author's writing style is not well developed, though the germ of a good story is in there. Unfortunately, this book was at times too far fetched and at times too predictable.

I picked this book up over the weekend because the cover and story seemed intriguing and it was a Nicholas Sparks type novel. I read this story in two days and loved it!

Wyatt and Gabby are bound by tragedy when Gabby's husband drives drunk and kills Wyatt's wife and son. Five years after the accident, Wyatt decides to revive his late wife's program "New Beginnings" which helps troubled teens by combining therapy and horses. Gabby's rebellious fourteen year old son Trevor is accepted into the program causing Gabby, Wyatt and Trevor to deal with the tragedy that intertwines their lives.

This is a great story. I love the horse part of the storyline. The book is filled with vivid characters like Ram-Wyatt's father, Aunt Lou and Big John and Mercy who work on the ranch and Reverend Jacobson.

If you love horses or Nicholas Sparks, then I think you'll definitely enjoy this book!

It is an ok book. I liken it to a chick flick, a Lifetime or Oxygen movie. The same story has been portrayed one hundred times. It's predictable and only worth a paperback not a hard copy.

For those who are touched by grief and loss, this book is for you. For anyone who loves someone with Alzheimer's disease, this book is for you. There aren't too many books that address so many topics in one setting, so to find If Wishes Were Horses, is a true gift. Of course, it helps to be a horse lover to boot!

Saddle your horse and head out on the range with these lovable characters and you won't be home before sundown. I was continuously amazed at Ram's ability to forge ahead while staring down the Alzheimer's bull. He pushes Wyatt out of his season of grief and confronts him with a choice: keep dying each day or step out of the shadow of death and start to live again.

There is a cast of characters all in need of this forgiving medicine and luckily they find it in God's own way, especially with a little help from the local Father. I found the story's inclusion of the redeeming power of God's forgiveness via the gentle hand of a kind Priest to be such a welcome respite, especially in today's culture. The issues of Grief and loss are properly addressed with each character finding a healthy way to put away their pain and move forward into the future; something that is extremely hard to do. I also found the glimpse into Ram's mind and how he has planned for the darker days, to be such an honest look at how it must feel to know that the forgetting times are coming. He approaches his illness with true grit. The way that the love story unfolds is also true to life as oftentimes it is hard to know what the other person is thinking, especially when characters are used to keeping their true feelings private and pent up for such a long time. So the fleshing out and the finding out how to be around others and enjoy life again, is very realistic.

Mr. Barclay keeps his voice alive and real, the dialogue is crisp and scenery moves along while presenting monumental issues; it helps to have the sound of man's gentlest and most forgiving creature, the horse, in the backdrop. One can easily lose themselves in the barn brushing manes, or practicing the walk, trot and cantor in the beautiful pages of this book. The end is bittersweet.

I hope Mr. Barclay keeps keepin' on because he is a good writer with great heart and shows the words to life. A blue ribbon, to be sure.

I will admit (despite the many neg comments here alone!), that I am a HUGE fan of Nicholas Sparks (skim thru my many reviews, and I'm sure you can figure that out!), so when I read that this book was written "in the spirit of Nicholas Sparks" I jumped right on it. While I will admit, the storyline and plot ARE similar to the types of stories that Sparks writes, the similarities end there. I almost felt like the author was TRYING (a little too hard) to write like Sparks, either that, or he was trying to reproduce THE HORSE WHISPERER, because that's what this book felt like far more than a Sparks novel.

I think the author is talented and I think he COULD write a good story for this genre, but rather than emulate the styles of Sparks and Evans, I think he needs to find his own voice. Figure out what his strongest points are and what makes him original. We already have far too many authors trying to duplicate what Sparks has done. I would much rather read a good story, with strong characters and come away from a book wanting more, than read a "copy-kat."

As for this book, I felt no attachment to the characters, the storyline was predictable, there was far too much "filler", and I never felt the NEED to continue reading. It was easy to put the book down every night (sometimes I wondered if I'd ever finish it!), and I even started other books in between, coming back to this one every once in a while (something I NEVER do with a Sparks novel -- I sit down and read that entire book cover to cover rather quickly!) I wouldn't say I've given up on this author just yet - there IS something there - but I think I'll be checking out his next title a little more cautiously.

Five years ago, Wyatt Blaine lost his wife and son in a collision with a drunken driver. As a way to keep her memory alive and to heal, he decides to reinstate the New Beginnings Program. This was his late wife's project, an equine therapy program for troubled teens held at the Blaine's family ranch.

At the same time, Trevor, the son of the drunken driver, is having trouble at school. He's about to be expelled when his mother, Gabrielle Powers, tells the principal that Trevor has been accepted into the New Beginnings Program. Needless to say, the boy isn't happy.

Wyatt is unsure about his decision to let Trevor join, but soon warms to the boy as well as his mother. The change that comes about in all three begins the healing process they desperately deserve.

At first, I thought this was a Christian fiction, because one of the characters, a preacher, James Jacobson. He's the one who helped change Wyatt's mind about allowing the boy to attend the program. When Wyatt's first reaction was to use a curse word with "God," I knew that couldn't be the case.

The beginning started out interesting, but turned a bit too syrupy. I felt the dialogue was off. True enough, Trevor, trying to imitate James Dean, used phrases like "clocked him," but the other characters used close to the same phrases, like "gotten your lights punched out." If the setting had been in the 1950's era, then it would have worked better than in current day setting.

In addition, the pivotal points, after the built up to the climax, needed to be stronger, at least for my taste. I felt letdown when I found out what the fuss was about.

So was the story bad? For me, it wasn't. Even with my complaints, I wanted to read this one to the end and now that I have, there are no regrets. I think this book would be perfect for a much older crowd. Folks who want things to be like it use to be. A time when saying "Jesus!" or "For Christ's sakes!" was considered using bad language.