About OCEANO. Horse from the Sea

OCEANO. Horse from the Sea is a mythic tale of magical wonders and natural splendors in California’s early Santa Barbara.

Wild Girl, Niña Salvaje, a half-Latina and half-Anglo teenager in Santa Barbara, saves a drowning horse from the sea. The horse trusts only Wild Girl as its rider. At a time when girls were forbidden to ride on horses like boys, Wild Girl’s horse is decreed by powerful patriarchs to be taken from her.  

 With help from Raven Boy, a magical youth descended from the Rainbow People, Wild Girl flees with her horse into wilderness. Risking it all, Wild Girl and Raven Boy must outwit desperate men pursuing them through a land where cougars, bears, and condors threaten and wildfires rage. Wild Girl’s fate depends upon forging an unbreakable bond of trust with Raven Boy and mastering Nature’s rules of survival.

OCEANO. Horse from the Sea is inspired by the life of Faria Sanchez, whose heritage dates back to the California Gold Rush of 1849. The story was conjured by Faria and willed to her son, Thomas. Its earliest draft was lost during a Santa Barbara wildfire and was only discovered 50 years later when Stanford University requested research on the literary works of Thomas Sanchez. 

As an author of six internationally acclaimed novels, Thomas completed the story of brightly braided historical facts, natural splendors, and magical wonders. 

“Thomas Sanchez’s OCEANO. Horse from the Sea joins the ranks of Jack London and John Steinbeck’s nature writings celebrating the environmental wonders and natural grandeurs of California in a book inviting youthful readers to explore, learn, and be delight by. In our time of fast-changing climate ecology, fire threatened landscapes and endangered creatures, from bees to blue whales, OCEANO. Horse from the Sea portrays a place in time never to be forgotten, always to be protected.”