PBOTD 1st June: Carol Vaughan - Missing Matilda

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There are some books I wish I'd held on to. During my bookselling career, thousands of horse books passed through my hands, and I sold virtually all of them. Obviously if you keep everything, you don't make a profit. A profit is the object of the exercise, your local supermarket not generally being keen on taking a rather nice rare paperback in exchange for your weekly groceries. 

I've sold numerous copies of Mona Sandler's Steep Farm Stables and lots of Elyne Mitchell's Silver Brumby series in hardback, but I didn't hang on to a single one. I do bitterly regret the beautiful Paul Brown titles I had to sell, because I'd paid quite a lot for them to start with. And the Lionel Edwards' non fiction titles. And the facsimile Stubbs' Anatomy of the Horse. 

Blackie, 1964, 1st edn, illus Constance Marshall
I've also sold pretty well all of Carol Vaughan's titles in my time too, and only held on to one, Dancing Horse. The Matilda series all went, and I do rather regret that. I mean, you don't often see a pony book which has a Percheron on the front cover, and a windmill. Or a tiny knight with white lace curtain reins, if you go for the paperback. It wouldn't hurt to just check to see what's out there, would it?

Knight, pb, 1977

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