The two youngest of the four children – Edmund and Lucy – are staying with a nasty young relative, Eustace Scrubb over the holidays. The three of them are drawn into Narnia together through a painting of a ship at sea and find themselves on a real ship in Narnia with their old friend Caspian from the previous story. He is in the midst of a great sea voyage through many lands beyond Narnia, searching for great men of Narnia the previous king had sent into exile.

The four children return to Narnia, but don't even recognize it at first because it has changed so much. They slowly discover that time is different in Narnia from their own world and that hundreds of years have past. Narnia is now ruled by a wicked man who has no right to the throne. Their adventures involve meeting the rightful heir and raising up "Old Narnia" behind him.

My children have really enjoyed these simple stories about the adventures of a boy and his horse. Best for first through third graders – especially those who become proficient at reading when very young and not able to deal with more complex or mature themes. My oldest daughter fell in love with these books when she was six. She gobbled them up and they were a great bridge for her between easy readers and chapter books. My son, whose reading proficiency grew much more slowly, enjoyed them much later on. Here is a sample of the language:

This book is a bit shorter than others in the series, and so might be a particularly good one for less-confident readers. It seems to average about five lines per page.

In this story, Billy and Blaze search for the lair of a mountain lion that has been troubling ranchers and rescue a baby calf from a ledge on a cliff.