Joey

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY APR 16, 2018

Grief counselor Bleakley shares the touching story of Joey, a blind horse who struggles to adjust to his rescue facility. Focusing on Kim Tschirret, founder of Hope Reins (a ranch that employs rescue horses to help traumatized children), Bleakley explores how the facility took a risk by bringing in Joey, who needed a lot of love, care, and financial investment to make him comfortable in his new surroundings. Tschirret was inexperienced in running businesses and initially unprepared for the amount of work and money required to properly heal and train horses. She secured funding from a local church but still had to overcome challenges that drained her bank account and energy: repairing malfunctioning equipment, securing fencing around the property, and dealing with problems of her own making, as when she let Joey out and he was injured by the newly installed wire fencing. In sometimes overwrought prose ("2 Corinthians 1 explains that God comforts us in our time of need, so that we can comfort others in their time of need... comfort reserved for the hurting children and their families"), Bleakley shares how Joey learned to help other horses trust their handlers and comforted a seemingly inconsolable boy named Ethan who was rejected by the foster family that adopted his three younger siblings. Bleakley's sentimental book makes Joey a fine example of patience and unconditional acceptance, and will appeal to Christian animal lovers.