John Gordon ed.: Fresh Fields: More writing from out of town

By MARGIE THOMSON

This literary celebration of our rural heritage feels like an odd breath from a different country altogether when one is reading it against the backdrop of city traffic.

The sheer physicality of rural life is striking, as is the understated emotion of those more used to doing than expressing.

Gordon has collected an extraordinary range of writing, from the well-known Oliver Duff, Ruth Dallas, Jack Lazenby, Brian Turner, and lesser-known names from some of the many creative writing groups that have sprung up in rural areas. While the first volume was a celebration of those who "cut scrub, drained swamps, sowed swedes and strangled teats", this one, Gordon says, "is about those who, either directly or indirectly, inherited that land and suffered seasons of drought, saw traders leave and fly-by-nighters hover, watched prices drop as costs rose". Life in the real, indeed.

Shoal Bay Press

$39.95