Non-fiction Book Review
You do not have to fall in love with Broken: A Love Story, but I’ll bet you will. In Broken, journalist Lisa Jones opens up the “post-apocalyptic” world of Wyoming’s Wind River Reservation, to follow the life of Stanford Addison, a quadriplegic Arapaho horse gentler whose way with horses and people is “non-insistent to the core.”
Stanford ran wild as a young man in 1970s Wyoming. He broke hearts and horses and laws until, at age twenty, a car wreck crushed his spine and demolished his youth. Twelve years in a wheelchair finally resulted in Stan’s accepting and working for the spirits who spoke to him. He found his center. He began to give his gifts.
Jones takes to Stan’s dispassionate guidance, hungry for a deeper connection with her life. She writes: “I thought I was in heaven the way a goose flying on the fine salt breezes near La Guardia Airport thinks it’s in heaven right before it flies into the landing route of a 747 from Kansas City.” With humor and honesty, Jones faces down personal demons, learning that to be broken is one possible way to be whole.
You do not have to fall in love with Broken: A Love Story, but I’ll bet you will. In Broken, journalist Lisa Jones opens up the “post-apocalyptic” world of Wyoming’s Wind River Reservation, to follow the life of Stanford Addison, a quadriplegic Arapaho horse gentler whose way with horses and people is “non-insistent to the core.”
Stanford ran wild as a young man in 1970s Wyoming. He broke hearts and horses and laws until, at age twenty, a car wreck crushed his spine and demolished his youth. Twelve years in a wheelchair finally resulted in Stan’s accepting and working for the spirits who spoke to him. He found his center. He began to give his gifts.
Jones takes to Stan’s dispassionate guidance, hungry for a deeper connection with her life. She writes: “I thought I was in heaven the way a goose flying on the fine salt breezes near La Guardia Airport thinks it’s in heaven right before it flies into the landing route of a 747 from Kansas City.” With humor and honesty, Jones faces down personal demons, learning that to be broken is one possible way to be whole.
