Jane Badger Books
Julia Cotter
Julia Cotter’s Pony Thieves is the most traditional pony book to have been published this century. It was written in the 1940s, and then read to her children, when she changed the names of the heroes to Clarissa, Jonathan (her children) and Caroline (her youngest sister). Her daughter Clarissa is one of the founders of Girls Gone By, famed for their re-issuing of hard to find children’s books, and GGB printed Pony Thieves.
It is a good read; though I feel it is really two books. The second half, where the pony Spree goes missing, is I think the better. It is an unsparing read; the first half is more conventional. The book is still in print, though stocks are getting low.
Julia Cotter died in 2008.
Sources: Girls Gone By’s page on Julia Cotter
Pony Thieves
Girls Gone By, Bath, 2003. Illus by the author
Bibiography