Cloud Land (Penny van Oosterzee, A&U)

In the gripping and extensively researched Cloud Land, Penny van Oosterzee imagines what a small region of Queensland’s Atherton Tablelands has witnessed over both geological time and since white settlement. She describes her life there and the natural history of a small patch of forest, a plot of land that she purchased with her husband with a plan for research and regeneration. The detailed descriptions of the regenerated forest patches and the evolutionary pathways of humans, marsupials and birds are punctuated with stories from the ‘Killing Time’ of European settlement, when the devastation of the people of the top end, as well as of the tropical forests, was frenzied and almost complete. Focus is also brought to bear on various historic figures such as Dalrymple, Palmerston and Johnstone, who are revealed as some of the forces behind the shocking wave of merciless violence that preceded the razing of forests and digging of mines. As this tide of brutality slowly faded, a paternalistic bureaucracy settled in place, manifesting in Aboriginal reservations and the destruction of the ecology-strengthening practices of the local people. The final chapters of Cloud Land offer a glimpse of hope, with native-title rights across Australia and the listing of the Wet Tropics of Queensland as a World Heritage Area, as well as painstaking regeneration efforts and ongoing struggles against ever-powerful mining and development interests. A terrifying and heart-wrenching ride into Australia’s dark past, Cloud Land is an essential read for anyone interested in history, ecology or the cost of relentless development.

Warren Bonett owned Embiggen Books and has a degree in outdoor education. Books+Publishing is Australia’s number-one source of pre-publication book reviews.

Category: Reviews