Extract

‘I’ve been everywhere, man.’

So sang ’60s pop sensation Lucky Starr, in a song best enjoyed by the deaf.

But to my mind, Lucky was lying. Even if he really had been to all 94 of the Australian towns, regions, rivers and suburbs that his song sort of sometimes half-rhymes, that still leaves a fair number of places unaccounted for – and quite possibly Lucky-free.

Australia, as I imagine you’ve noticed, is really rather big. To truly go ‘everywhere’, you’d actually need to go to about four million places (including, alas, Perth and Geelong). You’d need to visit valleys and mountains, and drive through deserts and plains. You’d need to clamber over rocks, cross muddy creeks, and steer a boat between islands and bays. You’d need to buy maps and a compass, invest in boots and a backpack, and say goodbye to about half of your life.

I rather doubt that Lucky has done this – and, naturally, neither have I. Life is short, petrol is expensive, and there’s just so much good stuff on TV. But what I have done, dear reader, is spend time on Google, and run my eyes over a few books and maps. And in so doing, I have discovered something quite interesting. However boring many places in Australia might be, the names that we give them frequently aren’t.

Take ‘Snowtown’, for example. Which is a town with no snow.

Or ‘Bordertown’. Which is far from the border.

Australia doesn’t have any moles, and yet we have a ‘Mole River’, and while we have no monkeys, there’s a ‘Monkey Creek’. We don’t grow oranges in ‘Orange’ or bananas in ‘Banana’, and there’s no gate to keep you out of ‘Bogan Gate’.

Interested yet? Well, what if I were to tell you that ‘Dead Secret’ really does have a secret, and that there was a real mystery at ‘Mystery Bay’? Or that a ghost (or something like it) was once seen at ‘Ghost Hill’, just as ‘Monster Creek’ had a monster of sorts. But what can be found in ‘Blood Creek’? Or, indeed, ‘Coffin Bay’ and ‘Dead Man’s Pass’? You’ll need to read on if you want to know the answers – but take care in ‘Murdering Gully’ and ‘Misery Bluff’.

On a cheerier note, we also have a town called Tittybong – though it’s a bit of a disappointment (much like ‘Mount Disappointment’), as there’s nothing there but houses and shops. ‘Rooty Hill’ and ‘Fiddletown’ are perfectly respectable places as well, sad to say, just like ‘Cockburn’ and ‘Upper Swan’.

From ‘Horny Point’ and ‘Shag Island’ to ‘Mount Mee’ and ‘Iron Knob,’ Australia is full of places that sound very interesting and, well, kind of aren’t.

But against that we have place names that don’t sound inter-esting, but in fact have a story to tell. Behind the staid name of ‘Fremantle’ is the story of a rapist, while ‘Sydney’ dates back to the undead. Lord ‘Melbourne’ liked to whip orphan girls and Dr ‘Bass’ may not have been straight.

Want more? Well, sure. In Mt Buggery to Nowhere Else, you will discover that the king of ‘Kings Cross’ had his own royal sex chair, and Edward (Lake) ‘Eyre’ murdered dozens of kids. The ‘Simpson Desert’ is named after a man who made washing machines, and St Kilda was far from a saint.

I could go on and on, and in actual fact I have. The result is the rest of this book. Australia’s four million place names are filled with stories of hope and courage, and failure and cowardice, and murder and abduction and rape. This is a book about starvation and shipwrecks, convicts and corruption, mutinies and daring escapes. It’s a book about bungling bureau-crats and near-blind explorers, and brave animals who weren’t all that bright. This is a book with fat kangaroos, peculiar smells, wombat poo and wallaby’s urine.It is, in other words, a book about Australia. I very much hope you enjoy it.