The Land Boomers by Michael Cannon Melbourne University Press, 2013 (revised, print-on-demand edition), 409 pages, $34.99 It was my privilege, over almost half a century, to have followed in intimate detail the triumphant “best-seller” course of one of the most remarkable Australian books of all time: The Land Boomers, by Michael Cannon. No full understanding of the concluding decades of the Colony of Victoria, nor the subtler character—even to this day—of its jewelled city Melbourne, is possible without some apprehension of the land boom era, and of its appalling “bust”. For reasons which escape my understanding, the publisher over recent…