Mare — Emily Haworth-Booth

The story of a horse and the woman who loves her -- a lively first novel of not-daughters and non-mothers; animals and animal bodies; and how we find freedom, care, and community in unexpected places.

For a long time, a woman lives with her husband and their dog. She teaches writing courses, plods away at a book of her own, and doesn't think much about not having a child. Then the dog dies, and a doctor's visit reveals she can't have children even if she wanted to. Out of these conditions, a sudden, strangely familiar thought prevails: horses.

When she hears about a mare whose owner needs help part-time, it seems like an ideal arrangement -- and perhaps something to help with the emptiness, diagnosable and otherwise, that she's begun to feel. She has no problem sharing; she shares a garden with the children next door and chores with her husband. The horse will be something to care for, just two days a week, without getting in too deep.

But as she takes up riding lessons and medical treatments, walks and brushes and dreams of the horse, her affection develops into obsession -- forcing her to confront what it means to love a being who does not belong to her. Moving with grace, humor, and probing insight, Emily Haworth-Booth's Mare pulses with life and feeling and introduces an irresistible literary voice.