the mustangs at havasu, gallop, grazing, trying to make more of their own. pawing through the ice in winter to scrounge for forest. appearing in the backyards of the new leva towns that are recommend kiting across the desert, -- replicating across the desert. spreading seed so new grasses can grow, stopping for a drink, trying to cross highways, trappers running from bullets, on they go, but for how much longer, we cannot say. they really belong not to man, will james wrote, but to that country of junipers and sage of deeofdeep arroyos and mesas. now i just want to show you one picture. can you all see this? this is bug, the horse that survived the christmas massacre. outside reno in 1998. this is a picture of her taken last june. i had been visiting with her as you can tell, she's about 11 years old now, and she's just the sweetest and most big hearted horse i've ever met. i thought you might like to meet her. she's a spiritual and historical descendescendant of comanche, ae horses that are still running the west today, there are pain at most, 20,000 of the

i'd like to talk about first how and why i wrote "mustang."ut 10 years ago, a little over 10 years ago, in 1998, at christmastime, i was out in a desert bar in 29 palms california, waiting to meet with a source. i was finishing up my previous book, "29 palms," the true story of murder, marines and the mojave, about two girls who had been killed after the gulf war and i picked up a local paper and saw an item that said six wild horses had been gunned down outside reno and i was of course, extremely shocked and horrified. it was a terrible story on its face. and it started to person late. a couple of days later, there was another item that said, 12 horse carcasses had been found in the virginia range outside reno. and i was even more horrified by then. then by the end of that year, christmas eve, 1998, as the ball was dropping at times square and crowds were gathering to ring in the new year, across the ticker tape blasted the headlines 34 wild horses gunned down in the virginia range outside reno. now, by then, i was just completely mortified.