The Fossil Pits

The story of Walter Mantell's 1848 journey down the east coast of the South Island in New Zealand, to set aside reserves for Ngai Tahu within a large land-block purchased by the government, is countered with a modern woman's very different story of violence on a South Island farm. This evocative and finely observed novel reveals different ways of seeing the land as well as the deals made in politics and in love.