Gum

Wherever you travel in Australia, a eucalyptus is never far away. Some are stunted, others towering, and their bark ranges from silky to craggy. For thousands of years they have marked the continent's landscape and its imagination, and Indigenous Australians have told stories about their remarkable properties for just as long.

After colonisation, botanists spent more than two centuries trying to count, name and categorise the species, and this book follows that contest. It also follows a wider circle of eucalyptus enthusiasts, including explorers, poets, painters, foresters, conservationists, scientists and even railway engine drivers, all of whom became captivated by the trees and promoted their supposed powers.

The author shows how gum trees were credited with curing malaria, solving drainage problems that had baffled Roman emperors, greening the Sahara and revealing gold. Part magic, myth and medicine, the tree becomes a lens onto new worlds, unusual people and bold ideas.