I really want a time machine so I can hop back a couple of decades and give this to my twelve year old self. It’s the sort of book I ached to read at that age, when I would not have been able to think of anything better than a girl having to make a heroic journey with her animals for company following a disaster. Even now I loved this book and rooted for Evie all the way. Thoroughly enjoyable and I’ll be ensuring the library orders a copy.

The Thunderbolt Pony is a good story for any animal lover. It is a cute little story about Evie’s journey across the earthquake torn South Island of New Zealand, accompanies by her three animal friends. Her pony Gus, her dog Jock and her cat Moxy
I did enjoy to read the story through the girls eyes, and her troubles and challenges seemed real. However I found the beginning of the story a bit hard to get in to, as I found it a bit implausible that a 12-year-old girl could pin point the exact moment she developed her OCD. Don't get me wrong, the story was very touching and seemed logical of how her father's declining health to cancer cased her to develop OCD, but I found that part implausible.
That did not stop me from continuing reading the story, and I did enjoy that the author spent a lot of time showing how an illness like OCD can affect people, even in crisis and I think we need more books that empathize this. 
In the end it was a very moving story and I enjoyed to spend time with Evie, Moxy, Gus and Jock, and it emphasized the fact of not leaving anyone behind and that pets are part of your responsibility even when a disaster hit.