A River Rules My Life

A.H. & A.W. Reed Ltd, 1973. Reprint. IN good used condition. Previous owner name stamp inside. Some wear to dustwrapper.

This book is the story of Mona Anderson's twenty-three years in one of the most isolated sheep farms in New Zealand, a 100,000-acre station that occupies almost all the country between two great rivers and which runs from their junction back to the Main Divide of the Southern Alps.

Almost at her front door, the Wilberforce River runs in carelessly-braided, thigh-deep channels or as a treacherous, raging flood. When the river level is down the folk of Mount Algidus can reach or leave the station by crossing on horseback or heavy truck; when the river carries rain or thawed snow it fils the wide riverbed, destroys known fords, shifts its gravel banks and channels, and gives warning of danger or death to those who, in folly or necessity, essay to cross.

But although the river rules, this is not a book of death and danger. It is the story of an isolated little community of homestead folk, shepherds, cooks, and cowboys; of good neighbours (the nearest are seven miles down and across the river) of the Rakaia Gorge; of the working year with the merino flock; and of the host of characters and experiences that have marked Mrs Anderson's years at Mount Algidus, and which are recorded with vivacity, honesty and humour.

- from the dust jacket.