BLUE ZEUS

The struggle to save the charismatic wild horses of the American West animates this lavishly illustrated book that explores freedom and captivity.

Walker, a photographer, recounts her experiences with Blue Zeus, a wild stallion named for the exquisite color of his blue-gray coat. He also sports four knee-high white socks; a magnificently shaggy, wind-tossed mane; and a shock of hair that flops over his face to veil his brooding black eyes. The author, who judges him “the most beautiful stallion” she has ever seen, spent several seasons photographing Blue Zeus and his family of pinto mares and their yearlings and foals as they roamed the Red Desert Complex region of Wyoming. Her work is in part a pictorial essay on horse life. Her subjects graze, nuzzle, loll, and survey their grassy domain. Their idyll ended in 2020 when the Bureau of Land Management rounded up thousands of wild horses to clear range land for cattle. Thanks to his habit of leading his family out of approved Herd Management Areas, Blue Zeus was targeted for capture with no release. Later sections of the book relate Walker’s efforts to find Blue Zeus and his mares somewhere in the archipelago of BLM pens and arrange their adoptions by a horse sanctuary before they got sent to the slaughterhouse. The author’s homage renders the society of wild horses in vivid, evocative prose. (“Blue Zeus walked a little bit away from his family…and tried to nap in peace. First, little Fire got too close and Blue Zeus chased him away with ears pinned. Then Nike came over and he pinned his ears at her, but she was undeterred. Slowly the whole family came over, getting as close to him as possible.”) Walker’s pastorals are balanced by a gripping, intensely emotional cri de coeur against BLM roundups. (“It is a horrible feeling of helplessness: wanting to scream, throw up, as I see a horse go down or riders roping a foal and dragging it in.”) The color photographs are vibrant and glowing, posing the animals nobly against wide skies and distant mountains and conveying their fearful kineticism as they fled BLM helicopters. Wild-horse lovers will be fixated by the author’s arresting visuals and her dramatic story of equine pathos.

A captivating coffee-table volume that will fascinate the eye and pluck the heartstrings.