I don't think she was asking whether you'll see stories with animals (or fantasy with animal main characters) -- both of those are doing just fine. She was asking specifically about the My Friend Flicka, Rascal, Ring of Bright Water, Misty, etc etc type books which were incredibly popular when I was a kid and for quite a few years before and after. They've fallen out of favor -- really. With a real life animal, you not must have a human who actually holds center stage unless you're going for fantasy or humor (and even with humor, you usually see strong fantasy elements such as you'll find in James Howe's books and the Babe type books -- I can't think of the author's name off the top of my head.)
Nonfiction about animals still sells very well, though not every publisher believes there is a need for more of it. But a fiction book of the pure "Let's focus on this real life animal in a documentary-esque way only with a healthy dose of emotional personification" -- if you guys are seeing it in novel length work, I would love to hear examples because I'm not. I'd be open to reading titles like that if you can come up with some -- I am always capable of being wrong. But mentioning fantasy and nonfiction doesn't mean reality-based animal-focused fiction is back in vogue.
gran