The Rainbow Races

Fairy Ponies #5

by Zanna Davidson

Explore wonderful stories about a group of fairy ponies and a little girl called Holly, full of magic and adventure!This highly collectible series includes six books that provide huge girl appear with the irresistible combination of ponies, fairies, and a magical secret world. The Fairy Ponies series is part of the Usborne Reading Programme developed with reading experts at the University of Roehampton.

Genres: Chapter Books

96 pages, Hardcover

First published March 24, 2014

About the author

Zanna Davidson (also writing under the name Susanna Davidson) has been writing children's books for Usborne for nearly 20 years. She likes dogs, books and climbing trees. Follow Zanna on Instagram and Twitter at @ZannaDavidson

Reviews

[Erin Craig · Rating 5 out of 5]

The way Tiny Craig gasps!

[Victoria Austen · Rating 4 out of 5]

As usual Holly really enjoys it and I think it is rather flat

[Efox · Rating 3 out of 5]

Finally the story where we get to meet Izaguard. He's on the Meet the Ponies page in the inside cover, and I think he even showed up in one of the other books (see previous notes from Enchanted Mirror and Pony Princess about the timing of the stories) and I said "have we ever met Izaguard before?" to which the kids said "Maybe?" but now you officially get to meet him.

Even though Pony Princess is supposedly the 3rd book this one should clearly be third (maybe - again I'm super confused about the order of everything in this series) and it's got a pretty good story. Bad ponies show up and ruin the Rainbow Races and threaten to plunge all of Pony Island into eternal darkness and bad weather. Puck and Holly save the day, and meet Izaguard who helps them out.

[Joey Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

The fairy ponies are getting ready for the fun rainbow races, now that Puck is old enough to Enter he brings Holly the only human allowed in their land through the oak tree to be with him. Then an evil ponie called Shadow unleashes an ancient casket of storms and darkness. No one knows how to stop it but Puck and Holly are determined to find a way.

I loved this it was soo cute, I love stories with such magical worlds like this, it’s so magical. The beautiful little town gets over run in cold and darkness, I loved that Holly and Puck cared so much about each other their friendship was amazing. So even though they were struggling, they were cold and fearing nothing good was coming they still were there for each other as first priority.

The illustrations within this book were outstanding and so utterly gorgeous all black and white, but with stunning purple accenting that it made them stand out so much and they were just gorgeous.

I really enjoyed this story it was short and sweet, it had a conflict, it had magic, it had a little mystery, it had a great friendship and it had fun. It’s a great easy read.

[Cute Rabbit · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was soo good!In it we see Holly return back to fairy pony island and then there is a race that is going to take part called rainbow races but then shadow return and he released the storm stuff in the casket and the island goes all dark and has storms.
Then Holly and puck go on a mission to go and save pony island we meet a pony called Izagard who a wizard pony and is last in the line and he helps them defeat the casket by looking in his ancient books.📕 Then he gives them a spider which helps take all the bad weather away!

[Allison · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite part was when they stopped the storm with a spider they made from sticks and stones. The rainbow races are a race where the first pony through the everlasting rainbow wins the race. - 6 years old

[Julia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zanna Davidson's Fairy Ponies series ticks all the boxes: compelling, fast-paced stories with wonderful illustrations and a beautiful hard-cover format with a ribbon bookmark. My daughter enjoys it so much that we read "Rainbow Races" in a single sitting!

[Darbi · Rating 5 out of 5]

I liked the part where they raced on the beautiful rainbow.

[Dawn Reser · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rainbow Races is actually Book #3 in the Fairy Ponies series not #5 as listed here.

[Lilly · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think it was very cool. My favorite part was all about the food. It sounds delicious.

[Alison · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great to read with the kids. I liked the spider

[Ben Haskett]

Read in 2019; My daughter received all six books for Christmas, and though I didn't see anything inside the books that indicated the series had continuity, this seems to be the fifth in the series. So we missed a little bit of an intro to the various characters, but it didn't slow us down and my five-year-old daughter didn't seem to get hung up on anything. She was really excited to get these for Christmas, if for no other reason than the novelty of having "chapter books!"

I enjoyed reading it to her, and she stayed engaged throughout. There are a lot of big words in here, especially for a young child, but it seems the author pays very close attention to context so the meaning of each word is always evident. Further, there's a big focus on expressing how things feel, both regarding emotions and physical touch, which is very educational for a little girl still struggling to express herself--can't count the number of times I've asked my poor little girl to "use your words" when she's in tears with no explanation as to why. Very impressed so far.

[Marianne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very cute story for emerging chapter book readers. I read it after my daughter suggested I gave it a try and finished it while the football game was on! :)

[Michelle Laird · Rating 5 out of 5]

My daughter loves me reading these to her. She won't let me put it down