'We've had a hilltop fenced, to exclude sheep. A stony rise peppered with ancient white box trees. Sturdy, gnarled branches hollowed by time, cherished by birds, possums, sheltering their young. The fencer lives nearby, on a farm called Heaven. These paddocks, fertile slopes of productive red clay, north of the Murrumbidgee River in southern New South Wales, are heavenly. Such gentle terrain, waterholes on Pinchgut Creek, yellow box with monumental trunks, heartwood and bark and sap, lively records of so many seasons.' (Publication abstract)