I purchased this in soft cover, planning to give it to my mother for Christmas, but I read it first and liked it enough that I ordered the hard cover for my mother and kept the soft cover for myself. This is a fascinating read. What makes it more than a great animal story is the way it is told within the historical context of the time. There were so many interesting facts and descriptions detailing the period from before, during, and after the Civil War, Reconstruction, and into the early 20th century. The subject matter is extremely fresh, told in an easy manner that makes it fast and easy to read and yet memorable and thought provoking. The subtitle of the soft cover is slightly different from the hard cover -- soft says, the Lost History of the World's Smartest Horse; hard says, the Lost History of a Horse and a Man Who Changed the World. I suspect the change was made to attract readers. The text is the same in both versions.