I'm not 100% sure how best to review this, so I'm going to go ahead and give it a solid 3 stars.

This brief story follows the character Karolína as she comes of age in the 80s, in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic. From the standpoint of historical fiction, it proved to be a very interesting glimpse into what life was like for our main characters, especially as the regime fell apart and transitioned away from totalitarian rule, and seeing the way that shift impacted the various characters.

However, there was also a side plot of sorts about Karolína being able to see into people's souls and see who they were on the inside, and that bit was very weird. A lot of the "inner people" that Karolína saw felt a lot like caricatures, and I'm not quite sure what the point of it was or what was trying to be said there, or if it just somehow went over my head.

There was also a lot of bizarre and explicit sexual content throughout this story that I didn't expect to be there going into it.

I'd say the biggest content warnings to keep note of are the sexual content, lots of drug/alcohol use and abuse, parental abuse, and sexual assault/harassment.

This novella has no chapters and can be easily read in a single sitting of about 1.5 hours. It is set in what is now Slovakia, during the last years of Communism and the period immediately after. The narrator is Karolina, an ordinary girl growing up with a single mother. She finds an unexpected talent for 'show riding' - performing tricks on horseback - and her inner equestrienne enables her to reach national competitions and even travel to other places in the USSR. But with the fall of Communism, things change rapidly and her dreams may not be realised.

It's not a happy tale, but it is well written and easy to read. The translation is good without anything sounding badly phrased. Karolina is a likeable, believable character and her matter-of-fact narration works well. The book paints a small picture of life under Communism, and also shows how its end did not necessarily deliver the improved life that ordinary people had expected. There is a coming of age element too, about how the dreams and ambitions of youth don't always get realised. Well, I did say it wasn't a happy tale.

Although the writing is good and flows well, my ultimate reaction to the story was 'so what?'. Sometimes a very short novel can make an incredible impact, but it's rare. This one doesn't. There isn't enough time for real character development and for us to really feel all plot developments. I found it diverting, but not particularly moving. There is something very functional about it, perhaps reflecting the concrete Soviet atmosphere of its setting. It's short enough to be worth a read, unless you are really short on reading time, but don't expect magic.

"We swapped our barbed wire cage for one made of gold."

This very short story captivatingly recounts young woman's life growing up in Czechoslovakia, where she finds joy outside a difficult home environment through learning trick jumping at a local stables. Ironically, this apogee of youth falls under the totalitarian regime, and this novel paints an effective picture of the country at a transitional stage between two eras. I would therefore recommend it both to people interested in coming-of-age stories and those interested in social impact of totalitarian rule/Czech history.

The book is poetically written and has a great structure looping the beginning to the end. The translation was very natural; there were some minor formatting issues in the ebook (e.g. no space between punctuation and next sentence sometimes) and the spelling of the horse was not consistent between "Cecil" and "Sesil".

I read a free ARC copy of the 2022 ebook Parthian edition (translators Julia and Peter Sherwood) via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book was a mixed bag overall - didn't really enjoy the start and found it overly sexualised considering the main character being pre-pubescent. I definitely enjoyed it more towards the end.

I received a copy of this book through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book was around 2.5 stars for me.

I don't know if it's the translation or where my head is at but I feel like I struggled to understand this story. To me the description doesn't align with what I read as closely as I expected. Maybe there's things that I missed, but I'd describe this as a story with magical realism, but it also ended so quickly and early it didn't really deliver on what I was expecting. I also understand that this book isn't contemporary and takes place in the 80s, but there's offensive words used to describe people that I wasn't expecting.

The story its self is interesting. It delves into places I wasn't expecting and has some turns to it.

A brief and quirky novella with a fable-like feel that explores female lives through the fall of communism in what was Czechoslovakia. This has one of the most arresting openings ever, and Karolina has a strong and distinctive narrative voice. A solitary girl, she find friendship, acceptance and passion at a riding school where she becomes part of a trick riding team. - but, ironically, the liberation from communism and the growth of a capitalist market economy has unexpected outcomes. This could productively have been longer than 80 or so pages but the characterisation of girls and women living restricted lives is done well and Karolina's voice is compelling.

This is a coming-of-age story set in Czechoslovakia in the late 1980s. Karolina does not have an easy time growing up and escapes to a horse riding centre on the outskirts of the small town she lives in. There, she finds friendship and self-confidence and begins to train for equestrian vaulting competitions. Eventually though, her vaulting career has to come to an end. Intertwined with these events are the Velvet Revolution and the end of communism.

The novel is rather short but packs in a lot. It is full of strong female characters. I found Karolina’s voice thoroughly fascinating and enjoyed learning about living in such a turbulent period in time through the eyes of a young teenager.

Thank you to NetGalley and Parthian Books for the digital review copy.

A fascinating read about the bullied daughter of a slutty single mother growing up in Czechoslovakia in the years before the Velvet Revolution and also after. Karolina happens upon a horse, a stable and an equally bullied new friend, Ramona, and her life changes forever. Both girls learn to ride and then learn trick-riding and they compete internationally. Everything changes after the revolution and not in the ways that Karolina had hoped for.

This is a quick and satisfying slice of a time now gone. I enjoyed the book and enjoyed Karolina's voice except for one irritating thing, and it could have been the translation: the short sentences, especially in the beginning, are relentless in their monotony. I nearly stopped reading because it became so tedious but the story details made me persevere. After awhile, I forced myself to ignore the punctuation and just read the words.
#netgalley

As a child and then young woman living in a poor community in communist Czechoslovakia in the 1980s, an elderly and tired Karolina reflects on her experiences growing up. The roles of women and class on top of understanding a changing female body are wrapped up in a unique experience of being a part of a female trick riding team. Friends and family, love and betrayal are all examined before and after the Iron Curtain falls. Heartwarming and heartbreaking all at the same time. 4 starts

This might more accurately have been called a novella, being so short. It struck me as a realistic and raw portrait of a young girl growing up in Czechoslovakia under Communist rule. For as short as it was, it packed a powerful punch. Things were horrific under Russian control, but not any better perhaps even worse after independence. It begins at the end as an old woman commits suicide by stallion, angering a horse to attack and kill her.

Then we go back to her infancy and childhood as she grows up with a slutty mother, brought up by her grandmother. (How odd that I just finished reading Fight Night by Miriam Toews, also about a grandmother/granddaughter bond which I did not like.)

The girl discovers a horse-riding barn, becomes enamored of a horse named Sesil (or sometimes Cecil) and eventually learns to be a circus-like horse acrobat. Her body strengthens and changes as she becomes more expert, but her life does not.

This is a brief look at governmental contrasts (Do things really change when political change occurs?} but ends in a finely drawn sketch of a child of promise growing up in a country without it. Beautifully written and translated, it is worth your time to read.

Escaping the monotony of school and the chaos of home, Karolina finds refuge at a riding school. She and her new friend Ramona, also avoiding her tumultuous home life, become regulars at the paddock, and care for Cecil the horse. They eventually begin training as trick riders with their coach Matilda. Overcoming physical obstacles, navigating changes of adolescence, and feeling invincible as they perform, they establish a competitive team and rise to the top. Will their grit and dreams be enough to sustain their success? What will the changes in Czechoslovakia mean for everyone at the stables? Set against the backdrop changing political and economic systems, The Equestrienne gives readers a coming-of-age story with strong female characters.

An unusual and surprisingly compelling coming-of-age tale set in a small Czechoslovakian town in the last days of the Soviet Union. In just 80 pages the author packs a lot in, a marvel of an economical and condensed style of writing where very word counts and brevity doesn’t exclude depth. Karolina is a young teenager whose life changes completely when she comes across a riding school on the edge of town and befriends one of the girls who works there. Together they develop an act as trick riders, equestriennes, and go on to fame and glory. But when the Soviet Union collapses in 1989 and capitalism takes over, suddenly the girls’ world collapses along with totalitarian rule. The novel explores what it was like growing up in socialist Czechoslovakia and daily life in all its mundane detail is vividly evoked. The Soviet Union isn’t glorified but the reader is reminded that some people thrived under the repressive regime and that the ground was torn from under their feet when that regime collapsed. Socialism enabled Karolina to achieve her dreams. Capitalism wrecked them. It’s a powerful novella, with fully rounded characters, convincing dialogue, well-paced and with a convincing storyline. Highly recommended.