I’ve lived in Palm Beach for many years, arriving when it was an outpost for artists and those escaping the city for whatever reason. Sprinkled between the weatherboard houses of the underclass were the holiday homes of Sydney’s wealthy. Its distance from town kept Palm Beach’s natural beauty intact. But with the pandemic came flight from the city and an avalanche of over development. This book tries to capture some of the area’s awesome power and suburban serenity before the onslaught began. I doubt this Palm Beach will survive much longer as money and quick profits bring concrete mansions and a hatred of the natural world to this remarkable place, where a peninsular divides the Pacific from the still waters of Pittwater.