Babette Cole

Award-winning and prolific British author and illustrator of children's books. Born in 1949 on Jersey. As a child she loved animals, especially ponies, and her ambition was actually to become a vet. Money prevented this, and she instead attended art school and then used her talents to design and illustrate greetings cards. However, it was when she began writing and illustrating books that her career really took off.

Her books are mainly picture books for younger children (many also illustrated by herself) and are often humourous, with the humour sometimes being of an alternative nature. The books are noted for dealing with important issues of childhood in irreverant and sometimes zany ways which help her young readers to relate to them. Conventional stories such as fairy tales are turned on their head and seen in a completely new way.

Animals appear in a lot of her books, including ponies. She has written a humourous fantasy pony series about a Harry Potter-style boarding school with added equines! She has also written a non-fictional book about ponies.

Ms. Cole now has her own stud where she breeds show hunters. She also enjoys riding and competing side saddle.

There is a Babette Cole website where you can find out lots more about her and the books she has written.

Fetlocks Hall Series:
Zany humourous fantasy series which purports to be a cross between St. Trinians, Harry Potter and the pony books of the Pullein-Thompsons!

1) THE UNICORN PRINCESS
(BLOOMSBURY PB 2010)
SUMMARY: Penny Simms is pony-mad and is thrilled when she wins a scholarship to Fetlocks Hall, an equestrian boarding school. But Fetlocks Hall is no ordinary school: besides schoolwork and riding lessons, Penny has the opportunity to acquire secret knowledge about horses as well as find out about the magical unicorn world of Equitopia. Soon she is caught up in a desperate struggle to help the unicorns combat a terrible plot by the evil Devlipeds, who are plotting to overthrow them. Is Penny the Unicorn Princess whose arrival is predicted by the King of the Unicorns? Can she defeat the Devlipeds and save the unicorns and the pony world?

2) THE GHOSTLY BLINKERS
(BLOOMSBURY PB 2010)
SUMMARY: In her second term at Fetlocks Hall, Penny must use her special powers and the help of the school ghosts and ponies to stop the school closing down.

3) THE CURSE OF THE PONY VAMPIRES
(BLOOMSBURY PB 2011)
SUMMARY: Penny must rid the school of a flock of pony vampires!

4) THE ENCHANTED PONY
(BLOOMSBURY PB 2011)
SUMMARY: Penny helps her friend Pip solve the mystery of her parent's disappearance.

Collectors Info:
Paperback originals. In print and can be bought new an used in both the UK and USA.