Barn Blind

I never would have though after reading A Thousand Acres that Jane Smiley could write a novel like Barn Blind. It was a novel about a mother wanting her kids to succeed in every possible thing they did, including horse competitions. The intense story line is focused on the Mother, a horse trainer and instructor, that pushes her kids way over the edge. What I found very interesting, the way Smiley wrote this novel, is that she never had the mother even ask her children if they enjoyed horses. I know that if my mother made me doing something for that many years, such as gymnastics, I would have to love doing it. After competing in gymnastics for two years at the age of eight, I wanted to quit. I told my mother the feelings I was feeling; it was no longer fun, but stressful. I wanted to pick up horseback riding, and that is what I have been doing since the age of eight. Smiley created this novel in a way to make the mother the enemy. I thought it was interesting the way the family crumbled into pieces because of one character. In a way that was similar to A Thousand Acres; the way the father let his farm slip away to his two daughters.