Jess Racklyeft, Australia: Country of Colour, Affirm Press, June 2023, 48 pp., RRP $29.99 (hbk), ISBN 9781922863881
This is a beautifully designed book, with a colourful cover that has the title in embossed lettering. As appropriate to the book’s subject matter, the cover depicts and array of brightly-coloured Australian creatures – animals, birds, plants, and insects.
The endpapers are striped with the colours of the rainbow as well as others and on the title page, a crimson rosella welcomes us in to the book. A double-page spread introduces each colour, naming a place – red and pink are introduced by a page featuring Uluru, and the written text acknowledges the Indigenous peoples of these lands, a courtesy paid to the traditional custodians of each of the areas of Australia discussed in the book. The pages following the introduction of the colour are used to depict creatures and plants from all over the country that feature that colour or colours. The brown and orange creatures depict some well- known ones such as the platypus and some much less common ones such as Leichardt’s Grasshopper.
The information given about each place, creature or plant is very interesting and includes the Latin/botanical names for plants and animals. Some of the common names for creatures many people will not have heard of are as intriguing as the scientific ones such as the letter-winged kite, the skirl webcap (a kind of poisonous mushroom) or the beautiful-looking but powerful peacock mantis shrimp.
The author notes that, in her research for this book, she was struck by how quickly humans’ relationship to Australia’s world has changed from the time when First Nations people looked after country. Her book is both a celebration of Australia, of its landscape and the creatures that live in it and a plea for its conservation.
This is a book that will be enjoyed by readers of many ages and is one to be shared and re-visited many times.
Reviewed by Margot Hillel
