Welcome to ReadingRider.com; the online horse book research tool!

ReadingRider.com was developed by a horsewoman who wanted to help horse community members in finding books of interest. Only horse and horse-family related books are put on this site so that people can quickly find what they want before going to a bookseller or library.

Librarians can utilize this site to update library catalogs or better understand the materials that they currently possess. Parents can help children to become more excited about reading; many children become more interested in a story when they read about something that they can relate to. For any of the above circumstances, or for the horseback rider who loves to read, this site and its search tool have been designed to help.

ReadingRider.com’s unique keywords on each book are intended to help identify books that contain specific topics of interest. Is a child going to a summer camp? Type in “summer camp” to the search engine and see what happens. Are you doing research on cavalry schools? Type in “cavalry.” Do you want to skip all the generic riding books and find a book with ideas on teaching riding? Type in “teaching.” Do you love horses but your son will only read mystery books? Type in “mystery.”

Some books listed will have descriptions, ratings, and reviews. Many books will not yet have these sections included. Here is a key to what these things mean:

Description: Typed in from the copyright page of the book, the dust jacket, or the back. What the book is about, based on what the publisher has to say. Descriptions are the original work of the publisher, are owned by them, and are simply intended to help you better understand what a book is about before going to a bookseller or library. No infringement is intended. If a fact about a book is known, such as “this book was translated from the Italian,” the description is where you will find it.

Rating: How good of a book was it? The opinion of ReadingRider.com.

“Four Hooves Up” is a ride at full gallop! Books with this distinction were considered memorable, with good characters and plot, and in general, are deemed well-worth reading or adding to a library. “Easy Reader” and “Picture Books” with this designation often have enchanting or detailed illustrations that draw a young reader into their stories. Other books in this category are fondly remembered and read multiple times.

“Three Hooves Up” is a controlled canter. Books with this distinction were good in general but may have some dull parts or information that may not be always useful that do not otherwise detract from the storyline or pace of the book. In general, these books are ok – not outstanding but not a bad choice either.

“Two Hooves Up” is a slow jog. Books in this category were either not particularly useful, had missing or confusing information, choppy storylines, a good number of flat characters, or were not entertaining but still served some purpose.

“One Hoof Up” is a shuffling walk. Somehow it didn’t seem right to have a “dead horse” rating. These books were boring, filled with wrong information, annoying or unbelievable characters, poor conversation, extended drama without purpose, or otherwise required ReadingRider to grab a tall container of aspirin and remember to stop trying to “skim” the book.

Review: What did ReadingRider.com think of it? The opinion of ReadingRider.com

This section was included for ReadingRider to explain some of its ratings. Reviews are opinion and should be read as such. It is acknowledged that different people enjoy different books and you may very well disagree with a review but hey, it’s the freedom of speech.

A Note about ISBN's: Books included on this site date back to the 1800s, ISBN numbering was not created until 1966 and not all publishers adopted it at that time. That means that there were several decades of books on this site that lacked ISBN numbers. In order to compensate for this you may see a non-ISBN number in an ISBN field. If there is no ISBN number Reading Rider uses a Library of Congress number (if listed in the book), if the book does not list a Library of Congress Number but has a publisher's tracking number (like Scholastic's TX series from the 1970s) then that number is used. Finally, if the book really lacks all of the above then a year/letter combination is used. For example, the third book in 1930 Reading Rider came across would be "1930c."

The "Adult" Designation: If Readingrider.com has read a book and found it to contain adult themes and/or content it may be flagged as “adult” either in the keywords or in the review section. Depending on the family, these books may not be suitable for readers under the age of eighteen. Parents buying or checking out one of these books are encouraged to either read it or research it and make their own educated opinions before providing it to a child. This “flag” is the sole opinion of ReadingRider.com and should be taken as it is – an opinion.

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