National Velvet

"Put on your not-to-be-missed list." — The New Yorker

Her mother calls it "a breathtaking piece of folly," but fourteen-year-old Velvet Brown is determined: every night she prays to be the best rider in England, and every day she trains to win the world's most famous steeplechase, the Grand National. No woman has ever competed in the race, let alone won it. Velvet is skinny and frail, and her mount is a rough country horse that she won in a raffle. But she whispers her hopes and dreams into ...