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    War Horse
    War Horse
    War Horse
    Audiobook4 hours

    War Horse

    Written by Michael Morpurgo

    Narrated by John Keating

    4/5

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    About this audiobook

    In 1914, Joey, a beautiful bay-red foal with a distinctive cross on his nose, is sold to the army and thrust into the midst of the war on the Western Front. With his officer, he charges toward the enemy, witnessing the horror of the battles in France. But even in the desolation of the trenches, Joey's courage touches the soldiers around him and he is able to find warmth and hope. But his heart aches for Albert, the farmer's son he left behind. Will he ever see his true master again?
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherScholastic
    Release dateSep 1, 2010
    ISBN9780545285308
    Author

    Michael Morpurgo

    Michael Morpurgo is one of Britain’s best-loved writers for children. He has written over 130 books including War Horse, which was adapted for a hugely successful stage production by the National Theatre and then, in 2011, for a film directed by Steven Spielberg. Michael was Children’s Laureate from 2003 to 2005. The charity Farms for City Children, which he founded thirty years ago with his wife Clare, has now enabled over 70,000 children to spend a week living and working down on the farm. His enormous success has continued with his most recent novels Flamingo Boy and The Snowman, inspired by the classic story by Raymond Briggs. He was knighted in 2018 for services to literature and charity.

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    Reviews for War Horse

    4/5

    672 ratings79 reviews

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    • 3/5
      Albert, a British farmboy, loves the horse his father bought at auction. But his father, needing cash, sells the horse to a British officer, starting a series of adventures and misadventures in wartorn Europe, told from the horse's point of view.
    • 5/5
      Written in 1982 and a runner-up for the Whitbread, War Horse is the story of a young British boy and his horse, separated when the horse is sold to the cavalry and shipped to France early on in WWI. It is a universal story of war and suffering told through the eyes of a horse as he experiences it on the front. It is a unique, elegantly told, anti-war story. A YA book that adults will enjoy, too.The first person narration reminded me of old favorites of mine, Black Beauty and Beautiful Joe.
    • 4/5
      " Joey (war horse) recalls his experiences growing up on an English farm, his struggle for survival as a cavalry horse during World War I, and his reunion with his beloved master. ... "
    • 5/5
      Absolute fantastic book! Keep the tissues handy. This book was even better than the movie and I loved the movie.
    • 5/5
      The best horse tale since Black Beauty. Awesome! Sad. Wholesome.
    • 3/5
      There were some aspects that the book did better, and there were other aspects that I thought the movie did better.
    • 5/5
      I loved this book. Before I read the book I watched the film. How they built up Joey in the wires in the film was horrid and made me shed one tear but the book was even more built up. The ending was amazing but I don't want to say to much and spoil this great read.For the film: 4For the book a: 5
    • 3/5
      Narrated by John Keating. It seemed a little odd to me that a horse could be so observant on matters of war. But kids won't notice that quirk in logic. Keating presents this story in earnest tones, complete with German and English accents. A family-friendly audiobook production.
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed this story, so much. Joey, the horse, is the narrater of this story and told through his eyes. Mostly, he is shown kindness throughout, but he goes straight from pulling ploughs, to going to war with the British army and being captured by the Germans for pulling heaving cannons. The story has so much emotional depth.
    • 5/5
      This was my first book from a horse's point of view and I greatly enjoyed it! This is first and foremost about relationships, necessity, and PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). I recommend to any middle or high school student, plus there's a flim and play!
    • 4/5
      My kids have listened to this book before. And I saw the movie. But I never read the book. So I was intrigued by the movie so I thought you know most books are way better than the movie. And once again this is true. This is a very heartfelt and touching story. A beautiful story to read to young children and it opens a whole can of worms of what war does to this earth. How it reveals the evilness of man. But also the love that can overcome that evilness. I highly recommend.
    • 4/5
      I had seen the movie a few years ago and loved it, so I had to read the book. It is a touching story of friendship. It is also historical fiction about World War I, told from the perspective of Joey the horse. Joey is shipped across the English Channel to France and participates in the last cavalry charge. He witnesses trench warfare, is captured by Germans, and spends time with a French farming family. He encounters both kind and mean-spirited people on both sides. I think employing the horse’s perspective helps dilute the horrors of war in a way that younger people can learn the history of the era without becoming overwhelmed. It is an anti-war story that portrays the impact on both people and animals.
    • 4/5
      A powerful read about a horse and his boy.
    • 5/5
      This story was told by "Joey" a horse and the main character in the story. Joey, a very young horse, is purchased by a farmer at an auction who really can not afford him. His son, Albert, loves him, trains him, is raised with him and thinks of him as his own. When war breaks out, Albert's dad is in danger of losing the farm, so he sells Joey to the calvary. Joey becomes a warhorse. The rest of the story is his trials and tribulations while at war and his "owner's" stories as well. Albert, who was too young to join the military when Joey was sold, never gives up hope that he will find Joey and bring him home. A story of war told from a totally different perspective which may bring tears to your eyes.
    • 5/5
      Excellent book
    • 5/5
      -- What's it about? --A horse, Joey, experiences life as an army horse during World War One. He changes owner many times, but informs us at the beginning of his story that he has only ever had one true 'master'. By working for both the British and German armies, Joey shows us that despite the inhuman horror of war, soldiers on both sides were capable of kindness and ground down by circumstance.-- What's it like? --Evocative. Anthropomorphic. Sentimental.I loved this story (which is no surprise, considering I also loved Morpurgo's 'Private Peaceful', another story set in World War One), right from the opening pages when I realised, to my slight surprise, that our reflective narrator was a horse:'My earliest memories are a confusion of hilly fields and dark, damp stables, and rats that scampered along the beams above my head. But I remember well enough the day of the horse sale. The terror of it stayed with me all my life.'Sold to a man who appears to be a sodden brute, our narrator is christened Joey by the man's teenage son, an innocent who announces that:'But I tell you Joey, if there is a war I'd want to go. I think I'd make a good soldier, don't you? Look fine in a uniform, wouldn't I? And I've always wanted to march to the beat of a band.'Of course, when Joey becomes a part of the British Army, we see more destruction and pain than fine men in uniform. Joey's first experience of war is seeing the casualties leaving the battlefields to be repaired as best they can and this is a persistent focus of the storyline.-- What's to like? --Oh, so much! The simple storyline which follows Joey's fortunes. The way Morpurgo insists (albeit rather clunkily at first) that Albert's father, the sodden brute of the opening chapter, is a man made weak and unpleasant by circumstance, not choice. The presentation of the German and British soldiers as human beings in intolerable circumstances. The acute portrayal of gender differences in response to the news of war.There's no explicit violence or savagery, as suits a children's book, yet the horror of war is powerfully conveyed. It's possible some older readers may find the tone too didactic:'How can one man kill another and not really know the reason why he does it, except that the other man wears a different colour uniform and speaks a different language?'I think including explicit reflections like this one from a German soldier helps to make the horror of war clear to younger readers.-- Final thoughts -- Joey's ultimate fate relies heavily on coincidence and is very sentimental, which may not suit older readers, but this is clearly a children's story and so it didn't frustrate me the way it might have done in an adult or even YA novel.I thoroughly enjoyed this and read it in one day.
    • 3/5
      A good reputation can be a terrible thing. All I really knew about War Horse before reading it (apart from that it was about war and a horse) was that it was just about the best thing that would ever happen to me in my entire life.Sadly it wasn't. It wasn't bad, it was very nicely written and made me freshly appreciate the development of warfare over the course of the First World War (particularly the early, pre-trench period that is often passed over) but I didn't feel any special appreciation of it. Clearly the problem is with me; it works for a lot of other people – it works a lot – so the question isn't why the book fails but why I failed to click with it.For a start I'm not that mad on horses. They're excellent at pulling things and looking majestic in adverts for building societies, but I think I lack the romantic idea of animals that you need to favour their viewpoint over that of the many young men being slaughtered around them. Maybe it's the country boy in me. I read Watership Down last year and enjoyed it a lot more, but because I enjoy stories of post-apocalyptic survival not rabbits.It could also be that this is aimed at fresh young minds who haven't already been told a hundred stories of the First World War. But that seems patronising and unfair. Winnie-the-Pooh, Roald Dahl and The Chronicles of Narnia are all terrific books regardless of your age; the children's authors who fail are those who speak down to their audience, and Michael Morpurgo certainly isn't doing that.I wonder if there's also a degree of information feedback going on. So much of the originating praise for War Horse seems to come from the stage adaptation (which I'm still assured is just about the best thing that will ever happen to me in my entire life) and it's easy for that to inform opinions of the book as well. But the two are separate texts; that's why you have to pay twice for them on Amazon. Plays articulate ideas through metaphor, staging and stylisation (that famous horse puppetry) that is largely absent in the book. Perhaps I'd enjoy the play more.And, of course, there's the burden of expectation. A book would have to be The Great Gatsby to hold up to the level of anticipation the world had instilled in me when I came to War Horse, and any book that isn't The Great Gatsby is going to suffer from that.War Horse isn't bad: it's just not War Horse.
    • 3/5
      I am generally not a fan of books with animals as the protagonist (there are a few exceptions), but this one was actually very educational. It really opened my eyes to a side of WWI that I never knew about.
    • 4/5
      A moving account of World War I told from the perspective of Joey, the much beloved farm horse of Albert. Sold to the English Army by Albert's father, Joey travels through Europe with a number of owners from both sides of the war, experiencing kindness and cruelty. A somber look at war's effect on soldiers and civilians alike, this slim volume is recommended for fans of "Black Beauty" and readers looking for a fresh perspective on World War I. This book was adapted into a 2010 Tony award-winning play and is coming to the screen December 2011.
    • 4/5
      Michael Morpurgo's affinity with animals is evident in every book he writes, and "War Horse" is no exception. Usually, I loathe books narrated by animals, but this is a beautifully written, touching story about a horse and his young owner set against the backdrop of World War I. I am really looking forward to the movie release in a couple of weeks, and only hope that the producers do justice to this lovely book - it certainly deserves it!
    • 5/5
      Joey is the narrator of this story. He is bought at market by an unkind farmer and at first it appears that life will be tough, but the farmer’s son Albert takes Joey on and trains him up to be a proper farm horse. The two become inseparable. But when war is declared, Joey finds himself sold to an army captain. Albert is desolate and resolves one day to track down Joey and bring him home.

      And so begins Joey’s adventures in WW1. What will happen to him, and will Albert ever find his beloved horse again?

      I love Michael Morpurgo’s books. He writes for children on all manner of subjects at a level that they can understand, but never patronising them. His subjects are varied and always interesting (of those I’ve read, anyway!) and they always make me want to go and find out more about the subject after I’ve finished. This book is no exception – and it made me cry at the end! Definitely recommended – and I can’t wait for the film!
    • 3/5
      Audio book narrated by John Keating

      On the eve of WW I, Joey, a farm horse, is sold to the British Army, tearing him away from the young boy who has been his faithful companion, Albert. Joey goes through extensive training to make him into a cavalry horse, then is sent to the front, where he proves himself courageous and strong – a true war horse. The novel follows Joey as he is captured by the Germans, finds a kind French farmer to care for him, and eventually makes his way back to the British forces.

      Keating does a fine job narrating the novel, which is told from Joey’s viewpoint. The book is suitable for children ages 9 and older, although there are some scenes of animal cruelty that may be distressing for younger or more sensitive readers.
    • 3/5
      A story about the love between a boy and his horse. The power of love and respect. In 1914 Joey a young Farm horse is sold to the army. He witnesses both sides of World War 1 on the battle fields in France. An interesting highlight of the passing of time, how technology changed the way war was navigated. The new roles a horse had. High lights the human side of both sides in the war. Interesting to read through the eyes of the horse.
    • 5/5
      Joey is the War Horse in the title and we read this story as told in his voice. Wait … wait … before you roll your eyes and brush this off as another book narrated by an animal (granted there has been a glut lately) or think ala Mr. Ed, realize this book was first published in 1982. Sold into army use Joey is sent away from the farm and from his young friend Albert. Confiscated by the Germans and traveling through France Joey has many tales to tell about WW1. Meanwhile Albert has come of age and enlists for the sole purpose of hopefully, against insurmountable odds, reuniting with Joey.

      When I saw the previews for the recent movie based on this book I knew I would not be going to see it, but I was sufficiently intrigued by the story to read the book. I am certainly glad I did. What a wonderfully told story of a difficult time in history, with moments of tenderness and humanity, reminding us that there are good people … and horses … everywhere no matter what the circumstance.
    • 4/5
      Beautifully written. A simple story that tells itself.
    • 5/5
      I Loved this book! My favorite part was the fact that the story was told from the perspective of Joey (the horse) BUT it wasn't the typical animals act like humans (anthropomorphic) way of doing it. His perspective was that of a real horse. He doesn't experience emotions the same way that humans do, and he doesn't REALLY understand the depth of what most people are saying to him, but instead interacts with them and feeds off of their body language and tone most of the time. I also like some of the historical references that he makes such as "Some old duke who has been shot at somewhere" (referencing Franz Ferdinand and the shot heard round the world.) The big pictures here are duty and warfare.
    • 4/5
      What an excellent idea for a book! Our main character is Joey, a farm horse, and he is going to war. It certainly turns things around to have a horse tell a war story. And who wouldn’t love having a noble and loyal horse as our main character? I don’t think I will ever forget that wonderful scene when Joey walks right through No Man’s Land and both sides hold up white handkerchiefs for a temporary halt to gunfire to help the horse.
    • 4/5
      I've been curious about this book since its dramatization on both stage and film. With this year being the centenary of World War I, it seemed a good time to read it. For a very short book aimed at a young audience, it was surprisingly thought-provoking and moving. Joey, a farm horse, is sold to the British army at the start of the war, leaving the farmer's young son Albert behind. Joey serves as a cavalry horse and an artillery horse, and experiences the war from both the British and German sides. He is affected by both human and animal loss, due to combat and poor living conditions. The story is told entirely from Joey's perspective. Some events are only loosely explained, because Joey doesn't fully understand what is happening around him. The spare narrative actually heightens the emotional impact for the reader, making this book a unique way to expose the folly of war.
    • 3/5
      The atrocities of WWI as told from an equine perspective. Being that, the story lacks the gruesome harshness as war stories often have. Instead, the focus is upon the interaction and companionship between the men and these beasts, the war horses.
    • 4/5
      War Horse is a good children's book about a special bond between a boy and his horse. This would be a great book for a horse crazy kid, or one a child who has an interest in history. It is told from the perspective of Joey, much like Black Beauty in style, and follows him from the comfort of an English farm through the battlefields of World War I. Lots of little details help bring to life the setting and will distinguish this somewhat overlooked time period.