Kate Tongs is a Tasmanian poet. Her poems have been published within Tasmania, and more widely in Australia and in New Zealand. In 2013, Kate released an anthology of poems, with Tony Brennan, Jan Colville and Lorraine Haig, called The Persistence of Song, and in 2015 she launched her first solo collection, Falling into Birdsong. Living the River is a partial resurrection - with changes - of a work that was never formally published. The title Living the River relates to a poetry anthology the poet read in her youth - The Same River Once. It draws from some of Kate's previous publications and also includes new work. Many of the poems in this collection come from Kate's life experience.