The Foal in the Wire by Robbie Coburn
Title: The Foal in the Wire
Author: Robbie Coburn
Genre: Contemporary Verse Novel
Publisher: Hachette Australia
Published: 28th May 2025
Format: Paperback
Pages: 121
Price: $19.99
Synopsis: An astonishingly raw and beautiful verse novel about survival, love and the bonds between humans and animals from an important young Australian poet
Sam, a teenager, lives on a farm with his mother and emotionally distant father, a horse trainer.
Haunted by trauma and depression, struggling with school and disillusioned with his home life following the death of his older brother, Sam’s life changes when he finds a wounded foal tangled in barbed wire in one of the paddocks at the edge of their property.
In the course of rescuing and caring for the foal he becomes close with Julia, a troubled girl from the next property.
The Foal in the Wire is the deeply moving and inspiring story of Sam, his love for a girl and the horse that brings them together.
~*~
Fifteen-year-old Sam lives on a farm with his parents, struggling with school, trauma and depression. He’s haunted by the death of his brother four years ago and the fracturing of his family. Until he finds a wounded foal at the edge of the farm, and meets Julia. Julia lives on a neighbouring farm, and together, they start nursing the foal back to health.
Sam and Julia’s story is told through verse, and evokes the tragedy and trauma they have both experienced and are experiencing in their lives. They are both living in a world where they don’t feel accepted or seen by anyone, but finding each other sparks a new understanding and relationship, forged through caring for the injured foal. As the novel moves on, they learn more about each other, and standing up for themselves.
Verse novels grapple with topics like trauma and loss in different ways than prose. It’s a little more subdued and evocative, with serious undertones that show that everyone lives a different lives. They can bring emotions that teens may be feeling to light, and give them space to talk about them safely. It gives them a voice to explore these feelings; explore the things teens might experience that they don’t think they can talk about with anyone else. This makes them powerful vehicles for discussion as well.
The Foal in the Wire has a genuine voice as well. Sam comes to life through his interior dialogue, and his fears are front and centre as he watches his family falling apart. It’s a way to start healing too, or to consider how teens might navigate the world that is constantly changing, or feels like the world has stalled somewhat. The raw emotion is palpable too, and pulls you through the book, making it hard to put down. I wanted to know if the foal survived and what happened with Sam and Julia. It’s an easy book to get invested in. Verse novels are great for this, to pull readers along and keep them engaged. I was on my toes, wanting to know how things would turn out.
This is the power of verse novels – they play with emotions and pull at the heartstrings. They invest in characters emotionally. The brevity makes it work well – the details aren’t needed, because you can fill them in yourself. Some stories work better as verse novels, and it felt like this one suited the verse novel format very well. This was an exceptional story, very moving and one that I think teens will connect with, because it aims to understand how they cope with trauma and depression.