Kids into books: The Silver Brumby

Author: Elyne Mitchell

Illustrators: Ralph Thomson

Publisher: Harper Collins, $14.95

Age Group: 8-12 years

"I will call you Thowra," she said, waking him with her nose,"because that means wind. In wind were you born, and fleet as the wind must you be if you will live."

On that first day, while the storm blew itself out, Bel Bel did not take Thowra far, only down through the snowgums to a long glade that led to a heather-banked creek where she could drink.

That night they went back to the opening of the cave and the foal slept on the dry sand curled up against his mother's flank.

The next day she decided to take him farther, to a wide, open field in the snowgum forest, where the grass grew very sweetly, even as early in the spring as this, and where the creek ran shallow over a sand and mica bottom.