On 8th April 1811, the ship Friends sailed from England carrying 101 female convicts bound for the penal colony that was New South Wales. The crimes of the women and girls on board ranged from pickpocketing to murder, but most were convicted of theft. Susannah Noon, not yet in her teens, tried to steal four pairs of cotton stockings from a shop in Colchester. It earned her a sentence of transportation for seven years' 'beyond the seas'. It was a sentence that reverberated throughout her lifetime; she never returned to England. What drove most of these women, young and old, to crime was what ... View More...
There are many broad studies of the Vietnam War, but this work offers an insight into the harrowing experiences of just a small number of men from a single unit, deep in the jungles of Vietnam and Cambodia. It is the remarkable account of a Medal of Honor recipient whose brave actions were forgotten for over three decades: Leslie Sabo Jr. Sabo and other replacement soldiers in Bravo Company, 3rd Battalion, 506th Infantry (Currahees), 101st Airborne Division, were involved in intense, bloody engagements such as the battle for Hill 474 and the Mother's Day Ambush. Beginning with their deployment... View More...
My life has been a mad travelling show, meeting some of the strangest and greatest people who've ever lived. I've had my fair share of trouble and I'm lucky to be here. But I've always been a showman and I've done my best to preserve a precious part of an old Australia that's fast disappearing.' Son of a sideshow operator and trapeze artist, fourth-generation showman Fred Brophy grew up on the road, travelling the length and breadth of Australia. He did time in jail as a wild teenager before establishing his own successful boxing tent. It has become a star attraction in the Outback and is no... View More...
Meet Blue Bostock, Australia's first bullfighter and rodeo clown. Told in an authentic voice by an authentic Aussie character Blue Bostock: Australia's first bullfighter and rodeo clown is the colourful story of one man's life as one of this country's most famous rodeo riders. From his carefree days growing up in Mackay to international fame as a rodeo rider and bull fighter, Blue Bostock was never one to let an opportunity pass him by. Narrated by a true Aussie larrikin to one of his best mates, Geoff Allen, this book captures Blue's free spirit attitude to life, and his time on the Austral... View More...
This is the true life story of Smokey, King of the horse-duffers. One hundred years ago, as the Boer War came to an end, the rugged Kimberley Range formed the roughest and most remote cattle-country in Australia. It was five days hard ride from the nearest township of Wyndham to Smokey's Kimberley Underworld hideout. The police patrols sent out to arrest King Smokey faced a daunting task. The few passes through the forbidding King Leopold Ranges were guarded by fierce Aboriginal warriors known as Munjons. The Munjons waged a bitter war with the white stockmen, but for every spearing of the cu... View More...
As a black woman in a business dominated by white males, Oprah Winfrey has become a symbol of hope and success to a legion of fans. Born illegitimate and virtually abandoned in the deep South, Oprah has made it to the top of her chosen field with remarkable determinatin and talent. The path to fame was neither smooth nor painless. Oprah's unsettled, and often harsh, upbringing propelled her into a wild and promiscuous existence which continued until the strength of her ambition landed her a job in radio. The move into television created additional personal pressures and, at one particular low ... View More...
The biography of David Helfgott, a gifted young Australian pianist who suffered a severe mental breakdown and was institutionalized. Although brilliant and charismatic, he was insecure and reliant on anti-psychotic medication, but eventually overcame his illness to achieve artistic greatness. This story was written by his wife Gillian, who tells of the powerful bond between them and of sharing her life with a man who came through the darkness of his past. View More...
Graham Chapman reveals what it was like to be part of the revolutionary and zany Monty Python teamRequired reading for Monty Python fans, this true and false memoir is Graham Chapman's own hilarious account of his life as a Python and as a homosexual. The book equals Joe Orton's famous Diaries in providing an unblushing account of a gay lifestyle linked to entertainment. Full of outrageous fictions and touching truths, in telling surreal and outrageous lies Graham Chapman often uncovers a truth about himself and colleagues. The stories Chapman relates--whether as mountaineer or medical student... View More...
The astonishing life of Ned Kelly's mother While we know much about the iconic outlaw Ned Kelly, his mother Ellen Kelly has been largely overlooked by Australian writers and historians - until now, with this vivid and compelling portrait by Grantlee Kieza, one of Australia's most popular biographers.When Ned Kelly's mother, Ellen, arrived in Melbourne in 1841 aged nine, British convict ships were still dumping their unhappy cargo in what was then known as the colony of New South Wales. By the time she died aged ninety-one in 1923, having outlived seven of her twelve children, motor cars plied ... View More...
Harry Gallagher's memoir is both a story of achievement and a unique love story. As a child of the Depression in Sydney's inner west Harry and his best friend Gloria made a playground of the local tip. The resourcefulness he learnt in these early years stood him in good stead as he took on the world, launching the careers of Jon Henricks, Dawn Fraser and many other swimming legends, and bringing Australia an avalanche of Olympic Gold. 'This is a story to inspire. It creeps into your bones, makes you want to achieve.' - Dawn Fraser View More...
A bind up of Hugh Lunn's two bestselling memoirs, Over the Top With Jim and Head Over Heels. One of the classic childhood memoirs complete with vividly painted characters, teachers, siblings, parents, the people who came to the Lunn family's bun shop and most of all the suspicious Russian kid with the funny name, Dmitri Egeroff (Jim), Hugh Lunn's Over the top With Jim is a laugh out loud account of a bygone Australian era. Successive generations have fallen for Hugh and Jim and their mates, as the strong sales of the book can attest. Now in a bind up with the follow up, Head Over Heels, which ... View More...
Saigon,1967. Fresh-faced 25-year-old Hugh Lunn arrives in Vietnam at the height of the war to cover it for Reuters and quickly meets a fascinating cast of characters: journalists, Vietnamese, military and best of all, Dinh, the Vietnamese reporter and guide who spoke his own brand of English (Dinglish) and whose wisdom and humour become inextricably bound up with the young reporter's view of the war. Before long the author experiences the full horror and tragedy of war, and finds himself questioning not only the US/Australian role in Vietnam, but his own role in a war where images and words co... View More...
'the best Kelly biography by a country mile' The Australian A bestseller since it was first published, NED KELLY: A SHORT LIFE is acknowledged as being the definitive biography. Ian Jones combines years of research into all the records of the era and exhaustive interviews with living descendants of those involved, to present a vivid and gripping account of one of Australia's most iconic figures. About the Author: Ian Jones is Australia's foremost Ned Kelly historian. A former TV and film producer, he was a producer of the film 'The Lighthorsemen' (he also wrote the script) and also created th... View More...
Nemarluk, one of the most feared Aboriginal renegades in the north of Australia, had vowed to rid his land of all intruders. This is the story of the last three years of his life, and his extraordinary battle with the tracker, Bul-Bul, brought in by the Northern Territory police in a final desperate attempt to put an end to Nemarluk's fight. Ion L. Idriess had already brought Lasseter and Flynn to the public's attention with his action-packed stories. He had first-hand knowledge of the courage of Nemarluk and wanted to immortalise the man he called the King of the Wilds. View More...
In times past there was an Aboriginal man called Cumbo Gunnerah His people called him The Red Kangaroo. He was a clever chief and a mighty fighter (this man from Gunnedah) Later, the white people of this place called him The Red Chief. It would be hard to find a more satisfying hero than the young warrior Red Kangaroo, who by his mental and physical prowess became a chief of his tribe - the revered and powerful Red Chief of the Gunnedah district in northern New South Wales. His story is a first-rate tale of adventure but it is something more - a true story handed down from generation to genera... View More...
John Flynn is one of Australia's greatest folk heroes. His achievements are stuff of legend - no other Australian has had more monuments dedicated to him than John Flynn. Flynn established a network of cottage hospitals, flying doctors, patrol padres, welfare centres and radio transmitters to create a Mantle of Safety that would allow the Outback to be habitable for men, women and children. Critique: Ivan Rudolph brings out Flynn the man who, like no other,revolutionised the lives of people in the Never Never country of Australia. Fred McKay View More...
As a boy in Brooklyn's Red Hook projects, James McBride knew his mother was different. But when he asked about it, she'd simply say 'I'm light-skinned.' Later he wondered if he was different too, and asked his mother if he was black or white. 'You're a human being,' she snapped. 'Educate yourself or you'll be a nobody!' And when James asked what colour God was, she said 'God is the colour of water.' As an adult, McBride finally persuaded his mother to tell her story - the story of a rabbi's daughter, born in Poland and raised in the South, who fled to Harlem, married a black man, founded a Bap... View More...
'I couldn't see the tank. I couldn't see it...someone was screaming over the radio. "Scream all you want, I still can't see it," I said to my pilot. The next explosion was so close it lifted my chest armour off my body in the shock wave. The noise brought me back to my awful reality. I looked out of the sight to see the shattered cockpit glass. The next one would be it and we knew it.' Lieutenant Commander James Newton survived and was awarded the Distingushed Flying Cross for his bravery. In a career that has seen him in action in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Sierra Leone Northern Ireland and... View More...
Cory Friedman was an ordinary fun-loving little boy. That fateful March morning in 1989 started just like any other but later that day, he started to feel very different and the course of his life was set to change. It started with an irresistible urge to shake his head, and before long, his body became a volatile, explosive and unpredictable force. Overtaken by physical urges, tics and compulsions, the bright young boy started to feel and look like a puppet on a string. Cory had developed a rare combination of Tourette Syndrome, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Anxiety Disorder and other neurol... View More...
Teen idol. King of Pop. Voice of the common man. Australian of the Year. Friend. Icon. Superstar. John Farnham is the quintessential Aussie legend. As a teenager he gave up an apprenticeship to chase his musical dreams, hitting the big time with 'Sadie (The Cleaning Lady)'. A family man at heart, and the most loyal of friends, John was sometimes uncomfortable with the spotlight and for many years struggled to take his career to the heights that those close to him, including Molly Meldrum and Glenn Wheatley, felt it could reach. He finally hit his stride with 1986's Whispering Jack and th... View More...
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