Michael Lyne

I have an absolute genius at the moment for losing things: more specifically, books. I know I had H M Peel's Night Storm, because, in a rare burst of efficiency, I decided to catalogue my own collection, and there the book is, catalogued. There it is not, however, on the shelves. Goodness knows what I have done with it. Even more depressingly, my copy of the Picture Puffin, Riding for Children has also gone AWOL. This really is a bitter blow, as it's a book I had when I was still at Primary School. I can't even remember where or how I got it, but what I do remember is lying on the floor reading it. It used to live near my model riding stables, and I used to daydream wildly that I was the girl on Silver, riding through those dappled and sunlit pages. Here is the lovely Silver, who I have to say was considerably better behaved than any of the ponies I met in my childhood riding career. Or, in fact, since.


The illustrations were by Michael Lyne. He became well known as a sporting artist, but illustrated relatively few pony books - seven. Those he did illustrate are often very hard to find: he seemed to have a genius for illustrating authors who later became eye-wateringly difficult to track down.



Pamela Macgregor Morris' Blue Rosette, Don Stanford's, The Horsemasters, Glenda Spooner's Royal Crusader are elusive, and tend to be expensive. The worst of the lot is H M Peel's Easter, but Fidra have just announced they will be issuing this in July, complete with all the original illustrations. If you want Michael Lyne's own works, these are even worse: Horses, Hounds and Country , Parson’s Son and his Sketchbook are none of them cheap. Even these though are attainable, unlike his second book, which was destroyed in a bombing raid which hit its printers before it could be distributed. Whether this book ever saw the light of day again, I do not know. I can find no record of it. Presumably the original artwork must also, heartbreakingly, have been destroyed.



Michael Lyne himself served with the Royal Armoured Corps during the war, and after the war’s end, painted full time. He did start young. By the time he was four, he had already dictated and illustrated two books. After he went on his first hunt at the age of six, he was hooked, and his love of horses set the direction of his later life. As well as private commissions, he illustrated many hunting and equestrian titles. I am exercising considerable self-restraint at the moment in not rushing off and buying all I can find, but the need to feed the family on more than nettle soup is stopping me. So far.



For more information and cover shots, click here.