Nicolas Rothwell writes about Mike Smith's forthcoming book, The Archaeology of Australia's Deserts:

HALF a decade ago it became clear to Mike Smith, the bright star of Australian desert archaeology  that the time had come for him to pause, to rein in his unending field research in remote and windswept places. It was time for him to retreat to his study in Canberra and set down a summary of his ideas and his life's work: he needed to preserve a record of himself. Since his early 20s Smith, long attached to the National Museum of Australia, had been out in the deserts of the inland every year: digging, excavating, finding clues to the deep past of the continent and threading them together. He had played a key part in one of the great intellectual adventures of our time: the unearthing of Australia's prehistory. What had been the exact course of the transformations in the landscape of the red centre, and what had driven them across the millennia? How could we know the precise time scale of such far-distant events? Smith had built theories and carried through a long-term project of investigations: he had drawn a picture of the past worlds of Australia that lie buried in time. He had seen much and learned from many gifted scientists. And now there was a shadow over him: he was barely 50 and cancer was pursuing him, hunting him down. A race began: it was a struggle to shape and order past time in its sequence, and a race with time itself.

Read the rest at The Australian. Photo: Peter Eve.