Harland’s Half Acre

‘David Malouf is a fine writer - his novels conjure up a whole society and its complex past’ - Sunday Telegraph

Born on a poor dairy farm in Queensland, Frank Harland’s life is centred on his great artistic gift, his passionate love for his father and four brothers and his need to repossess, through a patch of land, his family’s past. The story spans Frank’s life; from before the First World War, through years as a swaggie in the Great Depression and Brisbane in the forties, to his retirement to a patch of Australian scrub where he at last takes possession of his dream.

Harland’s Half Acre tells how a man sets out to recover the land his ancestors discovered and then lost and how, in fulfilment, this vision becomes a new reality.