Stymie

"Home from World War I, Ben Held decides to escape his hometown of Newport, Kentucky, and become a barnstorming race-tracker. Bonnie Dennert, his sweetheart, chooses to stay behind. Years later, they are reunited amid World War II, when Ben returns home because horse racing has been banned across America. He wants Bonnie back, and tells her of Stymie, the great horse in the stable where he works as a foreman. When the ban on racing lifts, Ben hopes for Bonnie to join him so they can watch Stymie race together. In addition to Ben's evolving world, the novel faithfully follows Stymie's real-life career. A castoff as a young racer because of his vicious temperament, Stymie endured challenging campaigns to become a beloved horse in New York, where he raced for most of his career. Stymie's modest beginnings eventually earned him the nickname as "The People's Horse." The stories in Stymie highlight his early races and his legendary battles with other equine stars of the era, including the great Assault. Eventually the horse is retired and, with Ben, takes up residence at the fictional Galileo Farm in Kentucky, where their pasts are revisited through unexpected events. The stories of Ben Held and Stymie mark a place in time; Stymie's legacy and record might never be duplicated. Stymie is a narrative about devotion, victory and the relentless drive for an optimistic outlook during one of the darkest periods in human history"--