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More About the Author
Product Description
Book Description
Jilly Cooper returns to horses in a fabulously entertaining romp through the world of jump racing
Product Description
Etta Bancroft - sweet, kind, still beautiful - adores racing and harbours a crush on one of its stars, the handsome high-handed owner-trainer Rupert Campbell-Black.When her bullying husband dies, Etta 's selfish, ambitious children drag her from her lovely Dorset house to live in a hideous modern bungalowin the Cotswold village of Willowwood.
Etta's life is transformed when she finds a horribly mutilated filly wandering in the woods.She names herMrs Wilkinson and nurses her back to health. The filly charms everyone in the village, and whentests reveal her to be a spectacularly well-bred racehorse a village syndicate is formed to put the filly into training.Captivating vast crowds as she progresses from point-to-point to major races, she brings fame and fortune to the syndicate, until, at last, she is entered in the greatest jump race of them all.Can Mrs Wilkinson win the Grand National? And can Etta gain her heart's desire?
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
23 of 24 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Even though JC is back writing about her favourite subjects, horses and horsey types, this is not a patch on her best efforts, Riders and Rivals. She has included so many characters that she seems unable to differentiate between them herself; some of them are present literally to make up numbers in the syndicate at the centre of the story. One set piece early on, at a cocktail party, attempts to introduce all of these haphazard creations, and the resultant mish-mash, with people being profferred lines of dialogue simply to get their names on the page, is way below her best. Plotlines are mainly recycled from Riders and Rivals, and it appears obligatory to include at least one plump female character who is unlucky in love until pining causes the weight to fall off, and the hapless swain sees her for the beauty she is. No-one, it seems, is entitled to romance unless they are in possession of killer cheekbones.
A couple of promising plotlines get lost under the weight of dramatis personae, and completely daft lumps of astrological knowledge, gardening advice and veterinary tips. She appears to attempt a bit of social commentary (Liverpool is quite different to Cheltenham, apparently....) and has thrown in a failed suicide bomber, so that she can let us know her thoughts on Middle East politics.
Etta, her heroine, is frankly annoying, seeming to do little apart from cry, apologise for crying, then cry some more. I found myself skipping through the bits where she appeared, particularly by the end.
Finally, a thoroughly nasty relationship between a 15 year old girl and a man presumably over 50, included a repellent rape scene, and was blithely glossed over by JC. It was out of kilter with the sort of frothiness one expects from her.
Overall, had she been persuaded to drop about half of her characters, and a great deal of the verbiage about horse bandages, rose-grafting and star-gazing, the book might well have been half the size, but would have been better for it.
A couple of promising plotlines get lost under the weight of dramatis personae, and completely daft lumps of astrological knowledge, gardening advice and veterinary tips. She appears to attempt a bit of social commentary (Liverpool is quite different to Cheltenham, apparently....) and has thrown in a failed suicide bomber, so that she can let us know her thoughts on Middle East politics.
Etta, her heroine, is frankly annoying, seeming to do little apart from cry, apologise for crying, then cry some more. I found myself skipping through the bits where she appeared, particularly by the end.
Finally, a thoroughly nasty relationship between a 15 year old girl and a man presumably over 50, included a repellent rape scene, and was blithely glossed over by JC. It was out of kilter with the sort of frothiness one expects from her.
Overall, had she been persuaded to drop about half of her characters, and a great deal of the verbiage about horse bandages, rose-grafting and star-gazing, the book might well have been half the size, but would have been better for it.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
I bought the Kindle version of this book and, having been a huge Jilly Cooper fan for about 15 years, couldn't wait to read it. I have to say it was a big disappointment. The main protagonist, Etta, has many of the qualities I loved about Daisy MacLeod in 'Polo' but the spark that goes hand in hand with Daisy's kindness and naivete still hadn't emerged by the time I gave up on the book, half-way through. Etta was just a bit wet. I thought there were very few genuinely likeable or genuinely sexy characters in 'Jump!', of which I have found so many in Cooper's books over the years, amazing really since, as usual, there was a huge cast. I also missed the fantastic chemistry between characters and the outlandish sex scenes she used to write so well. There were lots of lecherous people of both sexes here but nothing much comes to fruition! I gave this book two stars because Cooper still writes some of the most evocative descriptions of the countryside and nature I've ever read, and I truly love them. I'm just sorry that on this occasion the rest of the book failed to move me in the same way. I've never not finished a Jilly Cooper novel - in fact, most of mine are dog-eared from many re-readings - so it was quite painful to admit that I couldn't care less what happened to Etta anyone else in 'Jump!' by the mid-way point. This experience left me feeling more than a little sad.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I have been reading - and loving! - Jilly Cooper books since i was a teenager over 20 years ago. My best reads have been Polo and Riders but i have read all her books. I actually liked Wicked.
However, after reading the amazon reviews for Jump! i was a bit hesitant about buying the hardback - now i'm glad i didnt!
I found a paperback at a charity shop - thank goodness. This book has so many people in it that even half-way through i still dont know or care who half of them are! I dont mind books being long - but this is LONG and weeks later i am still trying to get through it. I am going to finish it only because its a JC book and i like the animals in it - the main characters are weak and forgettable.
Is this the end for JC? I really, really hope not...
However, after reading the amazon reviews for Jump! i was a bit hesitant about buying the hardback - now i'm glad i didnt!
I found a paperback at a charity shop - thank goodness. This book has so many people in it that even half-way through i still dont know or care who half of them are! I dont mind books being long - but this is LONG and weeks later i am still trying to get through it. I am going to finish it only because its a JC book and i like the animals in it - the main characters are weak and forgettable.
Is this the end for JC? I really, really hope not...
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Back in the saddle? Long in the tooth and out of touch
A lifelong fan of Jolly Jilly, I was so disappointed with this book I don't know where to start!
A lot of other reviewers have been spot on about the token social... Read more
A lot of other reviewers have been spot on about the token social... Read more
Published 2 months ago by bookworm71
Utterly disappointing - don't waste your money
This book was utter rubbish. Predictable from the start with a long winded middle and a corny ending, too many characters, and could have been written in 100 pages max rather than... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Niccinoo
Classic Jilly
Ah Jilly, where do you get your puns from? This book was over run with them.
Great fun from start to finish, bought it as a holiday read and it was read by 3 people when we... Read more
Great fun from start to finish, bought it as a holiday read and it was read by 3 people when we... Read more
Published 4 months ago by anniel
silly jilly lets us down
i really used to love her books , so i was pretty excited at the start . Oh dear . far too long , too many pointless characters , daft plots , borring point to point horse horse... Read more
Published 5 months ago by cartoon
Excellent!
What can I say? Jilly Cooper at her best - it's a great read. I love her observation, particularly of human idiosyncrasies, and she shares my own love of animals, and attributing... Read more
Published 5 months ago by Hollysmum
Dreadful!!!
It's a long time since I last read Jilly and this is such a disappointment; I've persevered for 3 commutes but have resigned it to my Kindle 'bin'. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Jans
silly jilly books never let you down, guaranteed silly
If you're depressed, read a Jilly Cooper book, they're all silly, some are hilarious, this one is up to par, great for relaxing and certainly won't keep you awake at nights. Read more
Published 6 months ago by meggy48
Absolute rubbish!
I bought this book hoping for a really good read. I have put it down several times and tried again and have struggled to get a quarter of the way through it but I am not going to... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Janet
Just can't believe it - so disappointed....
Like so many others here, I have read (and re-read) all of JC's books and just love the Rutshire chronicles... but this was just so bad. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Hannahb
Not vintage Jilly, but still entertaining
It's great to have Jilly back writing about horses again! Having said that, Jump is a fun read, but not vintage Jilly. Read more
Published 6 months ago by K. Marzillier
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