This is a controversial and practical book. It paints a graphic picture of how we are going so wrong—but shows us that the answers are all around us.

Our whole approach to living on the Australian continent is unsustainable, and our time is running out. We must totally reinvent the way we think about, and make our living from, the land and its natural resources.

We must ‘think ourselves into the country’—and change our ideas of farming, urbanisation and conservation, so all three go hand in glove. We must learn how to raise gum trees alongside sheep, graze kangaroos amid our cattle, grow finger licken’ bustard as well as chicken, and plant mallee trees alongside our wheat. Our cities and towns must be part of the country—not an intolerable burden on the environment.

Michael Archer is Dean of the Faculty of Science at the University of New South Wales, Australia and was previously Director of the Australian Museum in Sydney.

Bob Beale is a well-known freelance writer whose work appears in the Bulletin, the Sydney Morning Herald and a number of other magazines.