Issie and the Christmas Pony: Christmas Special

Issie and the Christmas Pony: Christmas Special
Stacy Gregg

An extra-special Christmas story about Issie and her friends at pony club. With gymkhanas to win, rivals to defeat, mysteries to solve and ponies in danger to save – these books are perfect for all girls who love ponies.Issie had always wanted her very own pony, and perhaps this Christmas her wish would come true…In this gorgeous Christmas special, Issie tells the story of how she first met Mystic – and how a little magic helped Issie and her perfect pony to stay together for ever.A sparkling, festive prequel to the popular Pony Club Secrets series.

Pony Club

Secrets

Issie and the

Christmas Pony

Stacy Greeg

Copyright (#ulink_08044585-80ce-5c0d-894d-e1807976da5e)

HarperCollins Children’s Books An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2008

Text copyright © Stacy Gregg 2008

Illustrations © Fiona Land 2007

www.staygregg.co.uk

The author and illustrator assert the moral right to be identified as the author and illustrator of the work

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins ebooks

HarperCollinsPublishers has made every reasonable effort to ensure that any picture content and written content in this ebook has been included or removed in accordance with the contractual and technological constraints in operation at the time of publication

Source ISBN: 9780007288748

Ebook Edition © AUGUST 2009 ISBN: 9780007341443

Version: 2017-03-29

For Hayley and all the kids in Room 10, Merry Christmas

Contents

Cover (#uf48259a8-8504-5007-9966-65576af963c4)

Title Page (#u75b39b39-f9f1-5ce4-8f6a-c3c0d63d2aca)

Copyright (#ucdff178c-dcf6-581a-b2ee-14c641f4e8a1)

Map (#u6e5d5195-4909-5e51-8c48-97df34a2fb95)

Dedication (#ubf61a490-2360-5bcb-885e-e9a851d6afb5)

1 A Summer Christmas (#u8abd87ad-3a54-5a20-b5d5-971a630437c8)

2…Four Years Earlier (#ue3929755-5f1d-5e44-94fe-2eb73716605f)

3 The Perfect Pony? (#ub14a5767-ae06-5f39-a46d-c7cfdb50b166)

4 Winterflood Farm (#u172bbfbe-6fb3-5266-a7cc-722ac18e7676)

5 Bombproof Bert (#litres_trial_promo)

6 Dream Pony (#litres_trial_promo)

7 The Chevalier Point Pony Club (#litres_trial_promo)

8 Auction Day (#litres_trial_promo)

9 Going Once…Going Twice… (#litres_trial_promo)

10 The Worst Christmas Ever (#litres_trial_promo)

11 The Christmas Present (#litres_trial_promo)

12 Forever (#litres_trial_promo)

Keep Reading (#litres_trial_promo)

Glossary (#litres_trial_promo)

The Pony Club Secrets Series (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

1 A Summer Christmas (#ulink_b9710216-49e9-57ec-9bc0-edf099bd004d)

Issie Brown was just a little girl when she realised that Christmas was all wrong. Not wrong exactly, but sort of mixed up, muddled. Not the way it should be.

Christmas on TV was always cold and wintry. There were sleigh bells and snow and you crowded round a roaring fire with hot chocolate while your mum cooked roast dinner with turkey and plum pudding. You’d wrap up warm in coats and mittens to sing carols and then tuck yourself up indoors and watch the snowflakes patter against the window while you waited for Santa to arrive.

Issie couldn’t make head nor tail of it. Because Christmas wasn’t like that at all in Chevalier Point. It wasn’t snowing for starters-in fact, it was positively baking hot, the middle of summer, without a cloud in the bright blue sky. And there wasn’t any turkey or plum pudding. Issie couldn’t remember ever eating that sort of food for Christmas. For as long as she could remember her family had cooked their Christmas lunch on the barbecue down at the beach. They would wake up on Christmas morning and open their presents, which nearly always included a beach toy like swingball or a boogie board. Then they’d race down to the beach, where Issie would meet up with Stella and Kate.

While their dads put crayfish and scallops on the hotplate to sizzle and their mums set out the picnic blankets, the girls would swim in the sea, riding the waves in on their boogie boards. When lunch was ready, they’d sit down on the blankets, still wearing their swimming costumes, letting the hot sun dry their backs as they ate. Their plates would be piled with bright red crayfish claws, which they would smash open with nutcrackers, prising out the juicy white flesh, dipping it in hot melted butter and mopping up the juice with crusty bread.

For dessert there would be pavlova and strawberries and ice cream, and afterwards Issie, Stella and Kate would lie back on the grass in the hot summer sun until their mums were convinced their food had been digested and it was safe to swim again.

No roaring fire, no snowflakes. It was a very different Christmas. A New Zealand Christmas.