Saddle Club Super Edition 7 – Christmas Treasure

Bonnie Bryant's Christmas Treasure is a Saddle Club story for 9 year olds about three horse-mad friends and a Secret Santa with a catch.

What happens

It's the last Horse Wise meeting before the holidays at Pine Hollow stables. Max has a new rule this year. Nobody buys anybody a present. You pull a name out of a riding helmet and do a good deed for that person, something they'd never get round to doing for themselves.

Then the names come out. Lisa draws Max, who can do everything better than she can. Carole draws Lisa, the most organised person she knows. And Stevie draws snooty Veronica diAngelo, which is about the worst name in the helmet as far as she's concerned (she won't even talk about it).

December fills up fast after that. Carole's dad is a Marine colonel running a toy drive, so she's sorting a whole warehouse of toys for children who won't have much of a Christmas otherwise. Lisa's cousins are coming from Scotland and her mum is planning to cook haggis. Stevie is sure she's about to win the solo in the school Christmas play, and her only rival is Veronica. Again.

The story moves between the three girls, so you get each one's week from the inside. It's warm and busy and often very funny. Stevie orders ice cream in Christmas colours on a freezing day. Her last singing lesson starts with a huge burp, in front of a cockatiel who clearly has opinions!

There's plenty of horse stuff too. Lisa's mare Prancer suddenly refuses to cross a creek, just when Lisa wants to enter her in a competitive trail ride.

One gentle thing to know about. Carole's mum died a few years before the story. It comes up in a quiet scene at the warehouse when Carole finds a doll just like one her mum gave her, and her dad talks about remembering her at Christmas. It's backstory and it's handled softly, but it might land for a child who has lost someone.

This is number seven of the Saddle Club Super Editions in the library. The club and its two rules get explained again early on, so a new reader won't feel lost.

What to read next

If you've got a reader who loves ponies and a close group of friends, this is a cosy Christmas read. If they fall for these three, A Summer Without Horses has the same three friends in a very different season, starting with Stevie sliding out of a tree and hurting herself too badly to ride.