His love for Corr is no different than Puck’s love for her pony horse Dove. Sean’s horse is a mythological creature that kills at least person but that’s not really the point. From the outside, The Scorpio Races looks like a fantasy adventure novel, but at its heart it is a horse book and feels more akin to something like Seabiscuit than The Hunger Games. Both our protagonists have intense connections to their horses, and the story hangs on that bond. I rode them once or twice as a kid in scouts, but it wasn’t something I did regularly, and I have never had a deep emotional connection to a horse. I was never what you’d call a horse girl. To truly love The Scorpio Races, I think I’d have to care a lot more about horses. For Puck, whose parents were killed by capaill uisce, it is the only way to dig herself and her remaining family out of financial ruin. For Sean, a favorite in the race, winning again could mean the freedom to live life on his own terms. Still, the races are a major part of Thisby, and winning can mean everything. This dangerous competition is only for the bravest as riders do not race atop regular horses but rather upon capaill uisce, bloodthirsty mythological horses that come from the sea. I had high hopes, I had a gift card, and I was in the mood for some fantasy.Įvery November on the island of Thisby, tourists flock in for the annual Scorpio Races. It IS my favorite of all my books, after all.” It was hard to imagine that I could like this more than The Dream Thieves (which I love so much that it was my favorite read of 2020), but I definitely needed to check it out. On Goodreads, she gave The Scorpio Races five stars and explained: “You know I had to. It’s pretty rare that a writer will publicly pick their favorite work, but Stiefvater is pretty unambiguous about this. I love Maggie Stiefvater’s Raven Cycle, so my interest was very piqued when I saw an Instagram post indicating that The Scorpio Races is her favorite of her novels.

The scorpio races book