This book tells three stories. It is first and foremost a personal memoir of one farming family's life in Zimbabwe just as the civil war was winding down in the 1980's taking us through 30 years to present day. It is also a moving story about the horses they must care for during almost impossible conditions, and finally, it is a very close and personal view of what happened to Zimbabwe through Mugabe's disastrous dictatorship including the murder, looting and pillaging of white settler's farms.
The book gets going as the civil war ends and they settle down in an old abandoned farm that they laboriously rehabilitate through the years. They are commercial farmers, employing local workers and selling their goods to local and international markets. We get to see what life growing up on a farm surrounded by horses, livestock and wild African animals is like. And then the challenges begin. And by challenges, I mean, "it's a miracle we're still alive" challenges. While figuring out how to keep themselves safe, they also find ingenious ways to keep their growing herd of horses away from predators (including human ones who would eat them given the chance) - the herd grows as one family after another abandons the country leaving their horses behind. Over a fifteen year period, they find themselves on the move being forced out of one safe haven after another as Mugabe systematically destroys Zimbabwe's economy turning citizens into desperadoes. In the end, they find they cannot stay in Zimbabwe anymore so they flee to neighboring Mozambique - no picnic either.
Their horses, 104 by the time they trek into Mozambique, are lovingly described. You learn about horse care and training, their personalities and their strengths. This book appeals equally to the horse lover as well as anyone interested in recent history in a part of the world you hear little about.
A small telling anecdote - towards the end, as they are hosting some tourists on a seashore in Mozambique, the tourists look around and say the Retzlaff's must be so fortunate to be living in such a paradise! Tight smiles were available - if only they knew! Well, now we can.
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