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Woman on the Mountain
Living alone on a remote mountain in the harsh Australian bush would not be every woman's choice. In fact, Sharyn Munro has so often been asked, 'Why do you live there?' that she decided to write a book as her answer. The Woman on The Mountain is the resulting lyrically written account of her journey towards a sustainable and truly rewarding lifestyle in her beloved mountain forests, where she has 'only' the abundant wildlife for company. That decades-long journey was no smooth, planned passage, but a stumble over setbacks, propelled by almost accidental decisions. After the ups and downs of relationships, single parenting, and an unlikely variety of jobs, at 55 she found herself alone -- in the bush. Unsure whether she could manage the hard work and mechanical demands of a self-sufficient lifestyle, she nevertheless gave it a go -- and mostly succeeded
272 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2007
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
August 10, 2017
I found this book hard to follow and got the impression the author is highly critical of men in an unhealthy way and much too full of herself.
April 21, 2026
Inspiring, thought provoking, the subject of quiet recollection. A true story of an impressive and brave woman' s choices, viewpoints and opinions.
Compliments to the author, for choosing to share your life with us.
Compliments to the author, for choosing to share your life with us.
February 26, 2023
I chose this book for February’s bookclub choice: ‘a book you wish you’d read in school’, mainly because I imagined it would have helped prepare me for living life on a shoestring as a single mum for many years, and also because of my love of mountains, streams and wildlife from when I was a young child setting out for our family’s weekend country drives all around SE Qld back in the 50s and 60s.
My husband and I first met Sharyn when we stayed at her delightful B&B nestled in a valley between several lines of hills behind Port Macquarie on the mid-NSW coast back in May 2016. It was far removed from the home she lived in for several years earlier; the one this book is about.
At the time I had no idea she was a fellow author, but we soon compared notes over dinner about the joys of writing, even though hers are more memoir/environment based, while mine are pure fiction with glimpses into places we’ve visited on our travels.
This autobiographical account offers gritty glimpses into her life as a single woman, squirrelled away deep in the mountains, miles from civilisation or even neighbours - except for the furry/feathered/reptilian/creepy-crawly kind typical of the Aussie bush - and without any of the usual comforts those of us city/town/farm dwellers take for granted.
Sharyn, her first husband and their two young children, decide to leave the city to live the ‘simple life’, but soon find living on a bush block with a 90 minute drive to the nearest township (read basic grocery store/petrol station/post office/‘one copper’ police station) down a mostly dirt track between mountains, through overgrown gullies and a few creeks, and when you eventually arrive find there’s intermittent wifi, dodgy telephone wires, no running water, regular electricity or even a septic system, and garbage disposal entails a homemade ‘bush-safety’ incinerator, a compost heap, and piling up bags of recyclables and ‘dirty waste’ til the next trip to town, and you get the picture and realise this life ain’t so simple after all.
But despite all the hardships, this tough lady is in her element, even when her marriage breaks down and she’s left virtually on her own to deal with an early prototype of solar panels with a hard-to-understand manual, an unreliable generator that she can’t afford to replace for when ‘the sun don’t shine’, leaky misshapen gutters that spew water while catching a beaver’s sized dam of leaves and twigs, disintegrating mud bricks from wasps stealing clumps to make nests in her bookcases, an outdoor dunny with no door that’s perched on top of a hill several metres from her tin shanty, an outdoor shower rigged up to a cantankerous stove offering warm water (if you’re lucky) dribbling down the line, and a variety of greedy wildlife that keep eating your crops, flowers and anything edible you forget to lock up, as well as tackling bushfires, bitterly cold winters, wild storms and slippery leeches that hide in every dark crevice of your body!
Her descriptions on page 200 of both the vivid and subtle sunset colours reflecting on the eastern clouds, with a deep valley lying in shadow in between the easterly and western ranges, mirrors those we look out to most nights - I think our souls must be linked by the Master Creator’s clever way with a paintbrush over our hillside homes! Then a paragraph on page 204 describing fair skin, sunburn slathered with vinegar or cut tomatoes and then peeling it off in big strips again mirrored my childhood/teenage years - thanks, Dad, for passing down your ‘English-rose’ skin, and Mum for your remedies! Pity I didn’t inherit your olive skin like my two sisters!
Sharyn is a keen environmentalist, who’ll use anything that’s lying around - things that would, more often than not, be discarded by most of us - to save money and this precious world we all inhabit.
It’s a funny, moving, and eye-opening account of a large portion of her life, written with a dash of tongue-in-cheek wit, downright frustration, and a steely determination to survive living mainly alone on a mountain in the wilderness.
I give it 8/10 and take my hat off to her while expelling a big sigh of relief that it was her life and not mine, even though my husband and I live in a small alpine town in the Victorian High Country, but thankfully on a town-sized block with all the mod-cons of city living.
Well done, Sharyn, and maybe one day you’ll get to come and stay in our B&B with views out to the high country - there’s plenty of horses, sheep, cows and a vast array of friendly birdlife to keep you entertained, including tiny blue and brown wrens, gentle crested pigeons, noisy cockatoos - both the sulphur-crested and black and red gang gang varieties, the always busy bowerbirds and honeyeaters, families of a variety of brightly-coloured rosella and lorikeet species, along with several greedy galahs; even four generations of magpies who think we’re their parents demanding food each night before taking a dip in the birdbath in our front garden, and last of all there’s our gentle king parrots who line the gutters before swooping down to happily feed from my fingers with those bright eyes taking everything in while cooing gently to let me know they’re hungry. We also get the occasional echidna waddling by, but there’s no leeches, I promise!
Oh, and just like Sharyn, let’s all take care of this precious planet to the very best of our ability - after all, it’s the only habitable one in all of that vast universe around us…
My husband and I first met Sharyn when we stayed at her delightful B&B nestled in a valley between several lines of hills behind Port Macquarie on the mid-NSW coast back in May 2016. It was far removed from the home she lived in for several years earlier; the one this book is about.
At the time I had no idea she was a fellow author, but we soon compared notes over dinner about the joys of writing, even though hers are more memoir/environment based, while mine are pure fiction with glimpses into places we’ve visited on our travels.
This autobiographical account offers gritty glimpses into her life as a single woman, squirrelled away deep in the mountains, miles from civilisation or even neighbours - except for the furry/feathered/reptilian/creepy-crawly kind typical of the Aussie bush - and without any of the usual comforts those of us city/town/farm dwellers take for granted.
Sharyn, her first husband and their two young children, decide to leave the city to live the ‘simple life’, but soon find living on a bush block with a 90 minute drive to the nearest township (read basic grocery store/petrol station/post office/‘one copper’ police station) down a mostly dirt track between mountains, through overgrown gullies and a few creeks, and when you eventually arrive find there’s intermittent wifi, dodgy telephone wires, no running water, regular electricity or even a septic system, and garbage disposal entails a homemade ‘bush-safety’ incinerator, a compost heap, and piling up bags of recyclables and ‘dirty waste’ til the next trip to town, and you get the picture and realise this life ain’t so simple after all.
But despite all the hardships, this tough lady is in her element, even when her marriage breaks down and she’s left virtually on her own to deal with an early prototype of solar panels with a hard-to-understand manual, an unreliable generator that she can’t afford to replace for when ‘the sun don’t shine’, leaky misshapen gutters that spew water while catching a beaver’s sized dam of leaves and twigs, disintegrating mud bricks from wasps stealing clumps to make nests in her bookcases, an outdoor dunny with no door that’s perched on top of a hill several metres from her tin shanty, an outdoor shower rigged up to a cantankerous stove offering warm water (if you’re lucky) dribbling down the line, and a variety of greedy wildlife that keep eating your crops, flowers and anything edible you forget to lock up, as well as tackling bushfires, bitterly cold winters, wild storms and slippery leeches that hide in every dark crevice of your body!
Her descriptions on page 200 of both the vivid and subtle sunset colours reflecting on the eastern clouds, with a deep valley lying in shadow in between the easterly and western ranges, mirrors those we look out to most nights - I think our souls must be linked by the Master Creator’s clever way with a paintbrush over our hillside homes! Then a paragraph on page 204 describing fair skin, sunburn slathered with vinegar or cut tomatoes and then peeling it off in big strips again mirrored my childhood/teenage years - thanks, Dad, for passing down your ‘English-rose’ skin, and Mum for your remedies! Pity I didn’t inherit your olive skin like my two sisters!
Sharyn is a keen environmentalist, who’ll use anything that’s lying around - things that would, more often than not, be discarded by most of us - to save money and this precious world we all inhabit.
It’s a funny, moving, and eye-opening account of a large portion of her life, written with a dash of tongue-in-cheek wit, downright frustration, and a steely determination to survive living mainly alone on a mountain in the wilderness.
I give it 8/10 and take my hat off to her while expelling a big sigh of relief that it was her life and not mine, even though my husband and I live in a small alpine town in the Victorian High Country, but thankfully on a town-sized block with all the mod-cons of city living.
Well done, Sharyn, and maybe one day you’ll get to come and stay in our B&B with views out to the high country - there’s plenty of horses, sheep, cows and a vast array of friendly birdlife to keep you entertained, including tiny blue and brown wrens, gentle crested pigeons, noisy cockatoos - both the sulphur-crested and black and red gang gang varieties, the always busy bowerbirds and honeyeaters, families of a variety of brightly-coloured rosella and lorikeet species, along with several greedy galahs; even four generations of magpies who think we’re their parents demanding food each night before taking a dip in the birdbath in our front garden, and last of all there’s our gentle king parrots who line the gutters before swooping down to happily feed from my fingers with those bright eyes taking everything in while cooing gently to let me know they’re hungry. We also get the occasional echidna waddling by, but there’s no leeches, I promise!
Oh, and just like Sharyn, let’s all take care of this precious planet to the very best of our ability - after all, it’s the only habitable one in all of that vast universe around us…
February 24, 2021
What an indomitable spirit Sharyn has and what a life. Her passion for the environment shines through. She truly is an inspiration. I very much enjoyed this engaging, informative, intriguing, emotive and at times humorous book.
February 14, 2024
Enjoyed the parts about her interactions with the different birds and animals that wander through her property and how she built the house/how it works. The book did tend to jump all over the place timeline wise and there was a bit of waffling that didn't need to be in there.
September 19, 2011
I really liked the organization in this book. Her chapter headings were great. She is a good writer and made the book flow and easy to read. A really interesting way to approach autobiography. I was struck by her strong spirit.
April 25, 2012
Humorous and candid story of a woman that lives alone on a mountain in harmony with the native animal and with passionate symbioses in nature. Excellent reading.
August 20, 2013
I started off really enjoying this book but as it progressed I found it became a bit mundane and repetitive
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews