Jill pony books Ruby Ferguson

[Blackcats7]

I loved these books as a child and escaped my not very nice reality into Jill’s world long before I ever started working at a stables in exchange for lessons.
I have just seen that the rights have been bought by Jane Badger who sells vintage pony books and she has republished the entire set so I’ve treated myself, sad old woman that I am.

I remember that but I think it was in Prince Among Ponies by Josephine Pullein-Thompson

@Boiledeggandtoast
I can't remember but I suspect Cousin Cecilia would have a man to do that sort of thing😊

Thank you, it may well be as I read the Pullein-Thompson books too.

😄

I rather liked the bit where Jill and Ann were hopelessly failing to get a bunch of children to do a musical ride and Cecilia turned up and effortlessly bossed them into doing it perfectly

@BigRedCat I suspect Cecilia grew up to become Sukey Benedict from Polo

@DarkDarkNight
@Newuser75

I loved Jinny and Shantih!!

I had the whole collection until my mother gave them away without asking, it took me ages to replace them, and with the covers I wanted.

I still get them out and re-read them from time to time.

The horse on the original covers was a stallion called Farukh, and was always bolting with the girl who was called Julie. So not unlike Shantih!

Has anyone mentioned me yet?

Black Boy is his REAL name. Jill called him Blackie before she bought him, and used to give him carrots in his field. His name was changed to Danny Boy due to the pathetic modernisation of lots of children's books. Ridiculous! I've got ALL the JILL books and reread them all the time. Same with all of Monica Edwards' Romney Marsh and Punchbowl Farm books.

Not sad AT ALL. I still have shelves full of my old pony books. I love Jane Badgers fb page.

Mercy! I was WONDERING what you were up to these days!

Oh gosh yes! Jill went to see somebody and was greeted at the door by somebody shouting Mercy, Mercy, before she realised that Mercy was a name 😂
Fell flat on 10 year old me, who read so many dated books then, that i knew it was a name!
I identifies a bit with poor old Mercy and her big glasses!

Prince among ponies - was that the one with the difficult but beautiful Adonis? Or am I thinking of a different book.

Yes I just searched it , I read that book
The 2 main characters are having riding lessons and go to stay with a family with loads of ponies . Adonis is in the field , I think his owner is scared of him but she's a kick&pull rider so he was confused by this .

No prizes for guessing the brother and sister do get Adonis at the end .

There was another series were a group of city kids used to go to a stables run by a very dedicated owner ( Audrey)?
She meets a man in one book and they're horrified that she might close the stables but New Bloke helps to improve them .

I blame books like this for my childhood expectations that someone would give me a pony.

I remember all of these books and continued reading Dick Francis and similar well into adulthood.

Can anyone remember the series with the girl who had an Irish Wolfhound called Shannon and three horses (Serenade, Symphony and Solo)? It’s typical that I don’t remember the authors or the people in the books, but do the horses and other animals.

Oh , Serenade Symphony and Solo sound familiar but maybe they re-use the names in a lot of books ?

There was one where she schools horses for people and ends up with an amzing horse called Benedictine and the handsome hero (also a horseman)

One of those horses was called Symphony I think .

I loved that book with Adonis , I used to pretend that my very steady slightly portly pony ( Cuddles) was actually Adonis 😂

Symphony serenade and Solo....a Pullein Thomson book. August and Christina were the girls. I think Christina had the ponies ( and a groom) and she made friends with Augusta and the were asked to train a pony called Clown....?

While were on it, I've been trying to track down a book. I think it was called Dominic and he had a pony called Valerian and a dog called Benedict. Any ideas anyone?

Thanks for this post OP. I’m tempted to buy them - can find on Amazon individually but they seem expensive. Did you get them as a set somewhere else?

This is 3 Ponies and Shannon by Diana Pullein-Thompson and is sitting on my bookshelf.

I'm another one who has all the Jill books, but I preferred the P-T sisters, particularly Josephine. There was a series about a girl called Noel (who was infuriatingly lacking in confidence) which started with Six Ponies, and went through The Radney Riding Club, etc all the way up til she (and Henry) were about 18. The last book was disappointing as they were sort of grown up and there was a bit of will they/won't they romance that never really resolved into anything I seem to remember.

The only thing that I was SO angry about the Jill books that with 'Pony Jobs for Jill' she resolved at the end of it- as a 16 year old - to go and become a typist of something dreadfully sensible and joyless. It honestly felt like such a cop out where some editor had told Ruby Ferguson 'but of course we must not encourage girls to waste their time on ponies, they do need to become secretaries and have dull female lives'.

I was utterly enraged by this! Jill had been my heroine up til then.

There are books about grown up Jill but I don’t want
to read them.

@Greywitch2
Yes I hated the ending of the last book as a child, and still do. So disappointing when IIRC Captain Cholly Sawcutt (famous show jumper) had previously offered her a job in his stable - this wasn't even mentioned in the last book. Jill just meekly accepts giving up her horsy dreams and prepares for secretarial school, which is so out of character for her.
Such a bad example for her young female readers. Still infuriates me now tbh!

Fly By Night was K.M Peyton, with the main character Ruth, they were my absolute favourites, I can still remember the first line of the book !