Now eighty-seven, Blackman is a prolific and superlative writer, with an extraordinary life to draw on, not only the burgeoning Melbourne art world of her younger days and her first marriage to painter Charles Blackman, but her lifelong passion for writing and broadcasting, her intimacy with the bush, and her friendships with other writers, notably Judith Wright and Edna O'Brien. Blind since her twenties, nothing has stopped her leaping feet-first into the unknown, a glass of pink champagne in her hand.

Blackman devotes several of her essays to pleasure: the delights of perfume, coffee, childhood play, words, and solitude. 'Acrobatic words, the wriggle and turn of them' are her first love, and she invents, teases, and alliterates, to extract their juice and pith. She leads us back and forth across her life, picking up strands, double-dipping into memories to create a kaleidoscope of sensory detail, cheeky humour, and inner vision. Her exuberance can move you to tears.

Most of these essays have been published before, in journals and in Glass after Glass: Autobiographical reflections (1997), but, revived for this finely curated collection, they are fresh, contemporary, and exhilarating. Blackman has raided her boxes of archives to give us access to a visionary mind at work, inviting us in, not with the chatty informality of some essayists, but with respect and a confidence that we will follow her impish lead wherever it goes.