Rider at the Gate (1995)

Cherryh at probably her best, but with some nightmare qualities to it.

I don't as a rule care for 'scary', but this is on my shelf, and I've reread it several times.

Be sure to follow up by reading the sequel, "Cloud's Rider". ( )

I enjoyed this story which featured people and horses who can communicate with each other using images. I especially liked the interactions between Guil and his horse Burn and between Danny and his horse Cloud. ( )

This story consistently manages to spook me. Excellent writing. Recommended for anyone who likes the idea of telepathic horses, but thinks they'd be a really bad combination with teenagers, and thinks that horses are very unlikely to act like reincarnated saints.

Almost a western. ( )

Rider at the Gate. it's rather like an old-fashioned western, really, only on a far-away planet with telepathic, bacon-eating "horses". (in fact I just read something from Hank the Cowdog, and it fit right in ;) ) of course they're not horses at all, but the human population just seems to have named the native creatures after the familiar, Earth creatures they most resemble. and the spook-bears, goblin-cats, and nighthorses (as well as all the other native creatures) are different from Earth creatures in a very substantial way: they are telepathic, and use mind games both to protect themselves and to lure unwitting prey to their doom. it's a good thing that the powerful nighthorses are also rather curious, because if they hadn't investigated the human colonists and found them rather compelling, then the colonists wouldn't have had any defense against the other predators. entire villages went insane or were killed off with the help of telepathic manipulation before the nighthorses chose human companions called Riders. the Riders protect the villages, but the people's fear of the beasts outside the village walls includes the Riders themselves, beast-influenced as they are.

the story is about, in short, a late convoy trying to make through the mountains and to a village before winter; a nighthorse gone Rogue- insane- murdering people; a Rider who will stop at nothing to take down the Rogue who killed his partner; history between him and the other Riders converging on the same territory; a kid in way over his head trying to be of help. about not quite ever knowing what is truth, what is a trick, and what is just a dream.

it's a very good read. on a side note, I've been craving (bacon) and thinking in (brackets) for the past few days too. ( )