"I'm sitting down to write the opening lines of this book a year to the
day since my mum died. She is constantly in my thoughts, not just
because I miss her terribly, but because she was the inspiration for
this collection of stories about women who have come from very different
places to make a new life in rural Australia."
City Girl, Country Girl brings together the stories of women who have
left lives in the city or another country to build a new future in
places where knowing how to milk a cow or drive a tractor stand them in
far better stead than an ability to negotiate rush-hour traffic or find
a good cappuccino.
It ranges in scope from the classic outback story of Sarah Durack in the
late 1800s, to the author's own mother's experiences of swapping wartime
Melbourne for a dairy farm on the Limestone Coast, to the present day.
City Girl, Country Girl is a compelling and fascinating account of
these women's journeys as they struggle through personal tragedy,
hardship and self-doubt with grace, humour, perseverance and more than a
little hard work.
