''Riders'' is a 1985 novel written by the English author

Jilly Cooper Dame Jilly Cooper, (born Jill Sallitt; 21 February 1937) is an English author. She began her career as a journalist and wrote numerous works of non-fiction before writing several romance novels, the first of which appeared in 1975. Cooper is ...

. It is the first of a series of

romance novel A romance or romantic novel is a genre fiction novel that primarily focuses on the relationship and Romance (love), romantic love between two people, typically with an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending. Authors who have contributed ...

s known as the Rutshire Chronicles, which are set in the

fiction Fiction is any creative work, chiefly any narrative work, portraying character (arts), individuals, events, or setting (narrative), places that are imagination, imaginary or in ways that are imaginary. Fictional portrayals are thus inconsistent ...

al English

county A county () is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesL. Brookes (ed.) '' Chambers Dictionary''. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2005. in some nations. The term is derived from the Old French denoti ...

of Rutshire. The story focuses on the lives of a group of top

show jumping Show jumping is a part of a group of English riding equestrian events that also includes eventing, hunters, and equitation. Jumping classes are commonly seen at horse shows throughout the world, including the Olympics. Sometimes shows ar ...

stars and follows the ups and downs of both their personal and professional lives. It was turned into a

television film A television film, alternatively known as a television movie, made-for-TV film/movie, telefilm, telemovie or TV film/movie, is a film with a running time similar to a feature film that is produced and originally distributed by or to a Terrestr ...

, '' Riders'' (1993), directed by Gabrielle Beaumont for Anglia Television and broadcast on the

ITV Network ITV, legally known as Channel 3, is a British free-to-air public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television network. It is branded as ITV1 in most of the UK except for central and northern Scotland, where it is b ...

. On 5 November 2019 ''

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'' included ''Riders'' on its list of the 100 most inspiring novels.

Plot

Set against the backdrop of the English

Cotswolds The Cotswolds ( ) is a region of central South West England, along a range of rolling hills that rise from the meadows of the upper River Thames to an escarpment above the Severn Valley and the Vale of Evesham. The area is defined by the bedroc ...

countryside, ''Riders'' follows the fortunes of a group of fame- and money-hungry

stars. Jake Lovell, the gypsy-born hero of the novel, is a brilliant horseman desperately seeking revenge for years of bullying at the hands of the glamorous but brutish aristocrat

Rupert Campbell-Black Rupert Campbell-Black is a fictional character in the Rutshire Chronicles series of Romance novel, romance novels written by Jilly Cooper. He also appears in the film and television adaptations of Riders (1993 film), Riders and Rivals (TV series), ...

. With the help of his rich

debutante A debutante, also spelled débutante ( ; from , ), or deb is a young woman of aristocratic or upper-class family background who has reached maturity and is presented to society at a formal "debut" ( , ; ) or possibly debutante ball. Origin ...

wife, Tory Maxwell, he is able to set himself up his own yard and begins building a reputation on the show-jumping circuit. Meanwhile, Rupert is content living the jet-set lifestyle with best friend Billy Lloyd-Foxe, plus a string of beautiful women, horses and dogs. Meeting his beautiful wife, Helen Macaulay, does little to curb his promiscuity and he eventually falls back into a life of parties, alcohol, and casual sex. When Jake and Rupert meet again for the first time since school, old rivalries are reawakened as they fight it out to prove who is the greater horseman and, perhaps more importantly, the greater lover. Along the way, Cooper gives us a peek into the lives of this close-knit community of tops riders, their horses, grooms and families. We see the highs and lows of life in the equestrian world, but who will eventually come out on top in the final showdown at the Los Angeles Olympics?

Cover

When first published in 1985, the book's cover somewhat controversially depicted "a man's hand resting intimately on the seat of a woman's jodhpurs". The 2015 30th-anniversary edition's toned-down cover artwork moved the male hand from where it was firmly gripping the female rider's bottom to a much higher position nearer to her hip, generating some backlash from fans.

Reception

Cooper has unfavourably compared her 2010 novel '' Jump!'' to this and other early works. Former British Prime Minister

Rishi Sunak Rishi Sunak (born 12 May 1980) is a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party (UK), Leader of the Conservative Party from 2022 to 2024. Following his defeat to Keir Starmer's La ...

claimed in May 2023 that ''Riders'', along with other Cooper novels, were his favourite books. There is also a cliché about young women at some British boarding schools sharing copies of the novel to learn about sex. The novel appears in ''Eton Rogue''.

References

Novels by Jilly Cooper 1985 British novels Novels about horses Rutshire Chronicles {{1980s-romance-novel-stub