This collection recounts the story of leaving America, where the author was born, and of arriving in Australia, where she did not plan to stay. It is a tale of unsettling and resettling, of leaving as an ongoing process. Each micro-scene is a snapshot of time and place - spanning decades and moments, continents and conversations, wars, dreams and kitchen tables - to capture the psychological and spatial tensions between 'here' and 'there'. Leaving New Jersey is a lyrical re-experiencing of putting down roots and tearing them up, an extraordinary poetic account of an ordinary woman's quest for home.