In Search of a Wild Brumby

As someone who’s collecting as many horse books as possible with the view to have them available in a library on my property for all to read, it seemed it was about time I started to review the books I own… and other horse related books that I’ve read.

The plan for my library is to have a room full of books (hopefully in excess of 800) that line the walls and on a day that the weather doesn’t allow horse riding, all the agistees and clients of the riding school will be able to spend the day in my library just reading about horses.

Recently I was checking out a friend’s packed bookshelves while at her house and stumbled across In Search of a Wild Brumby.  Even though I had four on the go at the time, she insisted I borrow it and there was no rush with regards to getting it read and back to her.

Once I started to read it, I realised returning it wouldn’t have been an issue due to the book being hard to put down.

As someone who grew up on the likes of the Silver Brumby series by Elyne Mitchell, it’s fascinating now at 23 years of age to read about these places in the high country but from a non fiction point of view rather than the fictitious series I adore.

Keenan after being asked his opinion on the mass shooting of brumbies in the Australian High Country in a culling effort, struck out to meet those who inhabited the areas of northern Victoria and just over the New South Wales border that brumbies were found.

Through meeting such people his plan was to find the small number of remaining brumbies scattered over the country and observe them in their natural environment to determine if they were detrimental to the high country land.

A great look at the start of horses in Australia and our horse riding history, the book has been a great read and caused me to want to go check out some areas in Northern Victoria that I hadn’t before known existed.  I think the Blue Duck Inn will have to be on the list with some planned horse riding.

In Search of a Wild Brumby is well worth the read.

Author: Michael Keenan
http://www.michaelkeenan.com.au/
Non Fiction
In My Library? Absolutely!   A very interesting read with some great Australian history.

“Ride a wild horse against the sky, hold tight to his wings before you die, whatever else you leave undone, once ride a wild horse into the sun.”

tag: horse story, equine book review, michael keenan, equine author, horse library, horse writing