If Wishes Were Horses was such a visual book: I could see the characters, their home, their down-at-the-heels town; I could see the different events from the sad beginning at the children's home to Mildred's taking her two children to the bar for a "poetry reading." It was all so visual and immediate.
Although there were a number of sad moments, there was so much love and redemption and hope that it wasn't a book that left me with despair, nor a book I could put down!

Can a growing girl be more of a parent to her child-like mom than her mom is to her?

Is abortion sometimes a reasonable answer to teen pregnancy?

Do parental alcoholism, immorality, neglect, and borderline insanity necessarily result in a permanently damaged child?

Can a child, raised in an extreme emotional, physical and moral environment, form positive loving bonds with anyone?

Is escape from an unbearable present into an artistic and intellectual safe haven necessarily more redemptive than escape into drugs, alcohol, and socially destructive behaviors?

These and other disturbing social questions are gently and thoroughly explored in this masterfully crafted stealth social commentary wrapped in a surprisingly deceptive coming of age novel. In fact, a major reviewer suggests that it might be a YA choice and so it might, but if only that, it will be to the detriment of all readers .

Ms. Whiteford's impeccably translucent prose, her discerning eye, and philosopher's love of exploring large questions as simply as possible make this a book whose truths will be mined through many readings, the grateful reader gaining insight with each one.

As Spinoza reminds us, "All things excellent are as difficult as they are rare." This must have been a very difficult book to bring into being as it is indeed excellent and the ability to tell such a tale with such simplicity is truly rare.

Brava