The boy from Snowy River

"Jem Tyler is thirteen years old when he arrives at Foxhow station on the Snowy River in the year 1880. He is illiterate. But he has ambitions. Through a book that is read to him he sees a connection between a mare he owns and the ponies of the Mongolian steppes. But how could there be such a connection or how could he prove it? At age seventeen he sets out for the town of Albury to learn to read and write. A chance meeting with a horseman riding in a different direction leads him into an adventure at the end of which the story of his horsemanship and mettle of his pony become a legend" -- back cover.