Pony books, pony stories or pony fiction form a genre in children's literature of stories featuring children, teenagers, ponies and horses, and the learning of equestrian skills, especially at a pony club or riding school.
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The novel Black Beauty, although about a horse and not a pony, is seen as a forerunner of pony book fiction.[1][2] Pony books themselves began to appear in the late 1920s. [1] In 1928 British lifestyle magazine Country Life published Golden Gorse's The Young Rider which went to a second edition in 1931, and a third in 1935. In the preface to the third edition, the author wrote: "Since then the outlook on children and their ponies has changed very much for the better." She also noted an increase in equestrian pastimes: "Five children seem to be learning to ride today for one who was learning seven years ago."[1]
By 1996, a critic noted that the genre had "...been relegated firmly to the sidelines".[3]
The pony book genre is "frequently deemed idealistic"[4], ...cater[ing] for those typical fantasies of perfect friendship with an idealised companion". [5] A 2009 article posed whether readers of pony-series fiction could do more than simply get another book in the series, much as a young collector of My Little Pony toys would be compelled to add to their collection.[2] The article noted an alternative view of the value of pony fiction, that it introduces young readers to wider literature.[6]