The Perfect Horse: The Daring U.S. Mission to Rescue the Priceless Stallions Kidnapped by the Nazis Paperback – May 23, 2017 by Elizabeth Letts (Ballantine Books)

If you can picture a book which covers "two continents and more than eight decades", as author Elizabeth Letts puts it in her acknowledgements, you will begin to get an idea of how remarkable a story The Perfect Horse is.
Letts weaves an intricate tapestry which eloquently tells the story of how the American military manages to rescue priceless horses from imminent death at the end of World War II. These horses include the extraordinary, balletic Lipizzaner, the breathtakingly beautiful Arabians, and the powerful, stocky Russian horses. All would have died if this daring mission had not occurred. Why was this mission undertaken? No one really knows, but all the people who participated were dedicated to the horses. Possibly it was message of hope after all the horrors the world had been through.

A large and varied assortment of courageous men from Europe and the US fell into place, almost haphazardly, to accomplish this rescue. You will read about each of them in this book, and love them all. They manage to trick the Nazis into releasing these precious horses, which they had been hiding in order to breed them eugenically. What united these men on this mission? The answer to that one is easy. They all loved horses.

Each of these men is presented to the reader as a full character. The horses are beautifully depicted as well. When the author writes about them, the love she has for them is so powerful and passionate, yet so honest and true, the reader cannot help but understand what it is that drew her to such a massive undertaking. This chronicle of a barely known story which is a part of World War II, the most horrible war we have ever known, sends us messages from the past which restore our hope for the future. The redeeming actions powerfully illustrate the love of the horses which was evidenced by these allied men. From different countries they joined together on this mission to save these beautiful animals who could not speak for themselves. And save them they did. This is the most uplifting book about WWII I can possibly imagine. You don't have to be a horse lover or a War buff to be mesmerized by The Perfect Horse. You simply have to pick it up and read the first page. You will understand immediately.