What do a winged horse, a flying unicorn, a Native American jingle dress dancer, and quantum physics have in common? They are all involved in the plot of a new middle school-age book from local author Jean Russell Nave.

“Starprancer and the Blue Crystals” is a sequel to “Starprancer at Wild Horse Cave,” released last year. The adventure is centered around two young ladies, Aila and Lily, with Starprancer, the winged horse, leading the girls on another quest involving saving the lives of a mare and foal, part of the Black Canyon Wilderness Mustang Band east of Prineville, Oregon.

“Some thought that book left too many loose ends. I heard from readers that they wanted to know about what happened later on to some of the characters from the first story,” said Nave. “This got me thinking about each character. When you write fiction, you live with the characters who have come into your head. You care about them because they become so real. I was looking for a central theme or character for a sequel and one night, while watching an episode of ‘Oregon Field Guide,’ I heard the story of a Native American woman who performs a sacred healing dance, the Jingle Dress Dance. Her story gave me a new character and a wonderful theme for this book.”

Aila and Lily are real people, so they were excited to be in another book.

“Starprancer, who has now been in three of my books,” said Nave, “came flying back into my mind, offering some of her own ideas.”

This book gave Nave an opportunity to work with the girls again and to get more feedback from their perspective as to how the story could work best.

Lily has become so involved with the story-writing process that she thinks she may want to become a writer when she grows up. She is actively writing stories in school while also being very involved with sports.

Aila’s love, besides sports, is art. Though Nave isn’t a professional artist, she does her own illustrations for her books and offers lots of encouragement to Aila to keep up the art. Aila says that art helps her relax.

“Starprancer and the Blue Crystals” is a 135-page illustrated book for middle school-age readers. The story begins when late one spring night, just past midnight, a mustang mare in a Central Oregon band of wild horses struggles to give birth to a new foal. The foal’s position in the mother’s womb presents an impossible birth. Unaided, both mare and foal will die.

“Starprancer,” a winged horse-angel, receives a message about the stressed mare. She needs human help to straighten out the foal’s bent leg, which is causing the birthing difficulty. Starprancer knows just the right two girls who could help with this situation.

At 1:01 a.m., Starprancer and her unicorn assistant, Jamil, arrive at the girls’ backyard in Sisters, awakening Aila. She and her sister, Lily, run outside, hear the story of the endangered mare, and agree to help.

Other challenges await the girls, but ultimately a healthy foal is born. They named her Lucky Girl. This is their story.

Starprancer uses many attributes that we are just beginning to learn about relating to the world of quantum physics. This prompted Nave to add an appendix for the curious student at the back of the book. This appendix explains some of the things that look like magic but someday will perhaps become everyday features of our future lives. She hopes one or two readers will become inspired to learn more about the amazing untapped quantum world.

“Starprancer and the Blue Crystals” is available for $7.95 on Amazon or for $6.95 at Paulina Springs Books.