High King Peter of Narnia rule the land fair, along with his brother, King Edmund, and sisters: Queen Susan and Queen Lucy. The people called it the Golden Age, of how yes, there were wars, but ones that Narnia’s won, who were led by Peter himself. Compared to the other lands, Narnia was the country to escape to. At least that is what Shasta dreams of, leaving his fisherman father and travel to Narnia and the North.

Shasta was pleased when he found out Arsheesh, the fisherman, was not his father. Arsheesh told him that he found a basket floating down the river, with Shasta inside and chose to take him in as his own. Except Arsheesh was a greedy man who used Shasta as free labor, and laughed at Shasta’s dream of traveling to Narnia and the North. When Tarkaan came to buy Shasta for slavery, he brought his war horse. But this was not any old horse, but a talking horse from Narnia. The horse, Bree, was taken as a foal, and decided that Shasta would be his escape to Narnia and the North. Not wanting to be sold, Shasta agreed and soon he and Bree were off. Along their way they face separation, lions, a girl and her talking horse, Rabadash, and worst still the past. The journey from the fisherman’s house to Narnia takes Shasta on a life journey, as he learns about himself, what he is capable of, and how after all he is someone special.

C.S. Lewis, well this story makes no sense at all. The only reason why it is book three (or five) is because time wise it is during Peter, Edmund, Lucy and Susan stay in Narnia. Where book two let the four of them discover Narnia, and ended with them falling out of the closet, this book takes place during their time at Kings and Queens. I did like how he included Susan, Lucy and Edmund in the story, and mentioned Peter frequently, too keep up with the time frame as well as linking the books together. Where Shasta was not a character you can like particularly much, you have to give him credit of how he was always a labor boy, and did not grow up to be particularly good at anything. Aravis was not that bad of a character as she had her quirks. The foreshadowing in this book was not as bad as the others, C.S. Lewis even included an important life lesson of, “But as long as you know you’re nobody very special, you’ll be a very decent sort of Horse.” I did not enjoy the ended as the author rushed things. It is like he wanted to give us the complete ending of Shasta life, so on the last page it read: okay so here is what happened in the next thirty years in case you were wondering. Still it is not that bad of a book and an easy quick read of 224 pages. Yet I will be glad when the series turns back to our original four.