se rare things: the true story of two families across twelve generations. They came to New Mexico seeking a new homeland, not to initiate a new society but to transplant an old one. What they found, as they lived their lives in what they came to believe was one of the most beautiful places on earth, was a forbidding land, both hostile and nurturing, and not unlike the land they had left behind. Their daily contact with its remarkable landscape assured that they would remain a pastoral people centered on their herds and flocks and, at once, one with the land. Culturally isolated and little disturbed by outside influences for over two and one-half centuries, they retained their way of life. Yearning for his roots and for a return to the land of his birth, Donald Lucero follows two families across twelve generations, from their entry into New Mexico at "La Toma del Rio del Norte," in 1598, to their achievement of statehood in 1912 and beyond. This account of their journey, littered with both joys and sorrows, invites the reader to share in the New Mexico experience.