Flying Changes

Over the course of a week, 17-year-old Denny has to teach one of the horses on the ranch how to do a ``flying change'' (an athletic maneuver performed while loping). Meanwhile, the girl's life is full of flying changes: she loses both her virginity and the boy she thinks she loves, her father breaks his back at a rodeo, her long-gone mother returns and her beloved grandmother moves out. With the help of her family and her best friend, however, Denny copes and grows up in a story that, while moving quickly, has a healthy message about self-sufficiency and the adaptability of the human heart. Readers will find little sentiment and few details of the equine part of Denny's life, but Hall's focus on Denny and her problems should keep all but the most rabid aficionados of horse novels satisfied. Ages 14-up. (May)