Understory: A Life with Trees

A memoir about staying in one place, told through trees, by the award-winning author of Mr. Wigg, Nest and Where the Trees Were.

The understory is where I live, alongside these plants and creatures. I tend the forest, stand at the foot of trees and look up, gather what has fallen.

This is the story of a tree-change, of escaping suburban Brisbane for a cottage on 10 acres in search of a quiet life. Of establishing a writers' retreat shortly before the global financial crisis hit, and of losing just about everything when it did.

It is also the story of what the author found there: the beauty of nature and her own path as a writer.