Hundreds of people turned up at the Abbey Road zebra crossing to mark the 50th anniversary of the August 1969 'photo shoot' for the famous Beatle LP. Driven by that same intent – to be there – thousands visit Australian locations hoping to be put in the picture about what had gone before, of those who drove livestock and established sheep and cattle stations while others panned for gold, butchered livestock and set up shop in what became the towns where travellers now roam.

Every now and then someone – Thea Astley, Peter Carey or David Malouf for instance – had gone there and mined the past for an exceptional literary work and if only you'd known about it at the time it would have made the location that much more interesting, the experience of being there so much more significant. 'Around Australia by Book' picks up on those novels, newspaper articles, memoirs and non-fiction works that make a given location – Bowen, Cooktown, Normanton, Warumungu, Elsey, Wyndham, Derby, etc – spring to life.

Those who read the first volume, 'Real Australia', will pick up a host of other books that tell the story of what happened where in Northern Australia.