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Ginger Gaffney

Autore di Half Broke: A Memoir

1 opera 53 membri 4 recensioni

Opere di Ginger Gaffney

Half Broke: A Memoir (2020) 53 copie

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This memoir was a joy to read. I loved Lily and all of her family. Jeannette Walls is writing about her grandmother in this delightful memoir. She is writing it in the first person, so it makes Lily so real and believable. I listened to it on audiobook, and Jeannette Walls did the narrating, which made the memoir even more personal and believable. The time is the first half of the 20th century, and it is set mostly in and around Arizona. Lily is a down-to-earth, no nonsense person. She spares no liking for people who are not as honest or as direct as she is. Even though Lily suffers a great deal of tragedy and turmoil throughout her life, the story of her life is triumphant and the prose sparkles. I truly enjoyed the entire thing, and am taking away a great deal of admiration for Lily Casey Smith. Thank you Jeannette for making your grandmother come to life like this. I thoroughly enjoyed this wonderful memoir of her memorable life.… (altro)
 
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Romonko | 3 altre recensioni | Apr 14, 2023 |
I really had had enough of "recovery memoirs" centering around horses, but I'm glad that I was urged to give this book a try. Ginger Gaffey clearly knows horses, and she's pretty good at people, too. If you've ever wondered why pairing people who are recovering from trauma with horses works, this book breaks it down. Gaffney's own sense of otherness and loneliness was healed through her own work with horses, although she doesn't dwell on it. Instead, she makes this book about the horses and the prison farm residents themselves, and that's what made the book a standout read for me.… (altro)
 
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vwinsloe | 3 altre recensioni | Aug 17, 2022 |
When you have been around horses long enough, you begin to see and feel and understand things about them and their relationships with humans that other people simply can't. I can't watch a Western movie without judging how well the actors ride (Redford, Duvall, Mortenson - they can sit a horse!). There are times when I've read novels in which horses feature prominently, and think: this writer "gets" horses (Madison Smartt Bell, Mary Doria Russell, Dick Francis at his and Mary's best), and sure enough, they have been around them in a serious way. And so, by god, has Ginger Gaffney. She "gets" how they look, how they move, what they like, how they snuffle and snort and bare their teeth and lash out. And she can write about it - beautifully, vividly. What makes "Half Broke" special and rising way above most the of zillions of "how this [horse, rescue dog, stray cat...] saved my life" memoirs infesting the book shelves these days, is how she, as a introverted, silent person so uneasy with people that she barely spoke until the age of 6, takes what she has studied and internalized about horses and interacting with them and uses it to learn to relate to a group of damaged, bottomed-out drug addicts and criminals on an alternative prison ranch in New Mexico.

Gaffney, an experienced horse trainer by vocation, is called in to the ranch because the half dozen or so horses who have been "donated" to the ranch are basically feral. Unschooled, unbroke, violent, uncontrollable, they represent the "most dangerous horse situation [she has] ever encountered." And she has zero experience or training for working with the ranch residents: some cocky and defiant, others caved in on themselves, traumatized, manipulative, or hostile. Over the course of a year or so, Gaffney has to figure out how to get these two herds to settle, to relate, and to not kill themselves or each other.

One by one, horse by horse, person by person, she confronts, soothes, observes, teaches, and worries. Before the residents can handle the horses, she has to teach the humans how to walk: upright, head back, loose relaxed strides... they barely comprehend what she means. But it is crucial: it's the body language, the projection of confidence that horses, creatures of movement and flight and tension, rely on absolutely for the development of trust and understanding.

It is hard work. There are setbacks: residents we have come to root for and care about fail and it's heartbreaking. But as a recovering addict friend reminds her: "You do know not everyone makes it out, right?" There are moments of grace, moments of fear, moments of challenge, moments of triumph. There are also moments of some overwritten navel-gazing that, while they explain some of Gaffney's own back story and troubles, are not as compelling. There's a terrific chapter about a clinic with "a famous trainer" who pressures Gaffney into ignoring her own (extremely sensitive and astute) instincts regarding a willful, terrified filly that results in injury to both Gaffney and the horse - she learns she need to listen to the horse and herself, not necessarily the "famous trainer" and his swaggering male acolytes.

And the cover illustration is absolutely gorgeous. What more could you want?

juliestielstra.com
… (altro)
 
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JulieStielstra | 3 altre recensioni | May 17, 2021 |
An alternative prison ranch in New Mexico, where non violent prisoners can apply, and serve out the rest of their sentences. Never knew there was such a thing, place. This is part memoir, part horsemanship, and if one loves horses this will fit the bill nicely.

Ginger is called to the ranch to help with a renegade group of horses that won't let anyone near. Arriving at the ranch, she feels a connection, to the prisoners and their lives and of course to the horses. Her love of horses once helped her and she feels needed at the ranch. We enter the lives and rythems of both the prisoners and the workings of the ranch.

Forgiveness, redemption and finding one selves as well as self esteem are some of the themes explored. I very much enjoyed all aspects of this book. Ginger writes the story well, both hers and those she comes to know at the ranch. Of course, I fell in love with a few horses along the way.

ARC from Netgalley.
… (altro)
 
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Beamis12 | 3 altre recensioni | Feb 22, 2020 |

Liste

Statistiche

Opere
1
Utenti
53
Popolarità
#303,173
Voto
½ 4.3
Recensioni
4
ISBN
6

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