Fortune’s Fool
Author
Mary Pagones
Author Bio
Mary Pagones is a writer and editor. An enthusiastic reader of all things pony-and horse-related throughout her life, she took up riding as an adult. This is her second novel, a sequel to her first book The Horse is Never Wrong.
Pagones received a BA from Wesleyan University and an MTS from Harvard Divinity School. She has studied creative writing with authors as diverse as Annie Dillard and Amy Bloom and literature with Cornel West and Stephen Greenblatt. She has lived in New Jersey, New England, and also in the United Kingdom. But her greatest inspirations as an author are the horses that have taught her so much about life and about herself.
Fortune’s Fool is dedicated to anyone who has ever accidentally acquired an animal—or taken any career path that the world regards as ill-advised to follow his or her passion.
And, of course, it is also dedicated to Pagones’ riding instructors who have shown great patience educating a rider without the talent or bravery of the central protagonist of this book.
Thanks to the positive press and requests from readers Pagones is currently researching a sequel to Fortune’s Fool, which will continue the adventures of many of the characters.
Description
“Ma, I just kind of accidentally bought a horse so I’ll need the trailer.”
No one wanted the rejected gelding. Even Simon’s mother told her son he was crazy to buy the horse. But Simon never listened to other people, otherwise he wouldn’t have decided to forgo going to college to become a working student at an eventing barn in the first place. Simon has always struggled–with fitting in, with being a poor boy in a rich man’s sport, and also with his sexuality. To be a rider, after all, is to be…Fortune’s Fool.
Recent reviews:
“Pagones strikes a good balance in providing an idea of what a day in the life of a working student might be without getting bogged down in daily details. There is no question that the work is hard but each working student has their own reason to be there, though their work ethics do vary. Life as a working student is not romanticized and Pagones makes it clear that aspiring to be a professional rider or trainer is not an easy career choice.” –Show Ring Ready
“First the fact that the protagonist was male was refreshing. I don’t recall a male main character in a horse series since Kit Ehrman’s Steve Cline. Simon’s ‘voice’ rang true, not only about his riding and relationship with horses, but navigating the late teen years of a boy who knows he is different in so many ways.
Being a working student for a trainer is a lot of drudge work and with a less capable writer the story could easily have become bogged down in the minutiae of daily chores. Yet the year rolled right along with lessons learned about horses, people, relationships and life.
The twist at the end was the only piece of fiction that felt a bit deus en machina but hey it could happen.
Over all I enjoyed Fortune’s Fool very much and read it pretty much straight through, which doesn’t happen often enough with the books I’ve read lately.” –Wendy J. Saunders, Amazon.com
Book excerpt
Chapter 1: You can tell the rest of the world to go hell, Simon
I’m having what I hope will be my last conversation on gravity, mass, and centripetal force. I already got an A on my physics final and a 4 on the AP Physics exam, so I know I passed the class. Physics is the one A I’ve gotten in high school. All that remains is presenting my final project. In a few days, the only gravitational force I’ll need to care about is whatever keeps me securely anchored in a horse’s saddle.
I like my instructor, Mr. Shackleton, all right. He isn’t one of those annoying teachers, the ones who assign pointless books and busy work, so I kind of make an effort, more than I usually do. I actually found physics really interesting. It came easily to me, and if I didn’t have so much else buzzing around and distracting my brain right now I might dwell more carefully on each and every number and word. My mind is roaming outside: it’s that brief period in June when the skies are still overcast and it is even somewhat cool in the shade: perfect riding weather. Almost New England weather, from what I can remember from growing up there and the vacations I used to spend in Massachusetts over the summer at my grandmother’s house, when she was still alive. It’s nice enough to ride every day but just cool enough that I don’t break a sweat beforehand.
At least my teacher asks his students to present the projects personally to him rather than standing in front of the class. That’s another advantage of having a socially awkward science dork as an instructor. I hate speaking in public, even though the guys in my physics class aren’t total idiots like most of the kids at my school. I don’t mind being watched alone when going around on a course during a horse show but in class it’s something different and I’d just rather not. I mean, I’ll do it when I teach a riding lesson, sure, or when I have to out of necessity (I’m not phobic or anything), but when a stupid teacher tries to make me present something in front of a class of people who hate me enough already and are looking for more fodder to make fun of, forget it. I have as much contempt for that kind of teacher as the ones who make a big deal about not giving homework the day of the prom.
Mr. Shackleton was always really cool about assigning labs and letting us try stuff out so we didn’t have to sit behind a desk all period. I hate sitting at a desk for hours a day, especially since I’m left-handed and my school doesn’t have enough desks for lefties in most rooms. I always have to bend over in a weird, cramped way and then my teachers say that they can’t read my handwriting.
Author Website
https://www.facebook.com/mary.pagones
