Books

Jack Spinty's booklet on Phar Lap from 1932 is augmented by Tom Thompson's locating Phar Lap's racing memorabilia - saddles, bridles, silks, race books and ephemera, fully illustrated.

A daring and thrilling journey into a fantastical world of shamans and vampires where Aboriginal dreaming and Gothic horror are woven together in early Australian colonial history.

This books looks at Idriess and his Aboriginal prospecting friends, the Bairds, working their way through far north-east Queensland over 100 years ago, from the Daintree and the Bloomfield Rivers to Mount Molloy.

In 1916 Alfred Wright enlisted in the AIF. After training at the Engineer Officer Training School in Moore Park and at Roseville NSW he embarked aboard HMAT A14 Euripides, headed for Britain. On the way, he bought an autograph book, and over the next...

Arthur William Upfield is well known as the creator of Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte (Bony) who features in 29 crime detection novels, most set in the Australian outback. He also wrote about 250 short stories and articles, drawing on his...

In 1838 Lower Canada was in turmoil with many French Canadians wanting a republic there, thwarting the British administration. Once the rebellion was closed down, 58 French Canadian rebels were sent to Sydney's Longbottom stockade north of Burwood, where...

The final book in the Idriess Guerrila Series, written in 1942 with the threat of Japanese invasion, full of interest regarding military tactics, and bush survival.

The first study of Margaret Preston's life in Berowra, north of Sydney, from 1932 to 1942, fully illustrated with her woodcuts, paintings and monotypes showing that area of the Hawkesbury River. Written by the curator of the Macquarie University Art...

The True Story of the Kelly Gang of Bushrangers, published in 1900, was a highly researched biography of the notorious 19th-century Victorian family of bushrangers. Chomley wrote the biography using court documents, police records and court evidence.] It...

The 5th in a series of 6 books written at a time of imminent Japanese invasion, this one gives us the full story of WW1 sniper Billy Sing, and other Australian snipers at Gallipoli and the Middle East.

Mudrooroo's classic novel of Aboriginal teenagers in Perth was published to great acclaim in 1987. This is the story of their young leader invoking the spirit of the mythic hero Sandawara, as they speak of revolution, revenge, justice and black power.

Before he became famous with his books, Ion Idriess wrote paragraphs and short stories for The Bulletin newspaper in the 1920s and early 1930s, often under pseudonyms like "Gouger" (a miner of Opals). This collection was first published in hardback in...

In 1838 Lower Canada was in turmoil with many French Canadians wanting a republic there, thwarting the British administration. Once the rebellion was closed down, 58 French Canadian rebels were sent to Sydney's Longbottom stockade north of Burwood, where...

The Fourth Manual written for Australian soldiers and civilians in 1942, when invasion by the Japanese seemed imminent. "To attack and to ambush, to snipe and raid is the job of the Australian Guerrilla. By rifle and grenade, by machine-gun and mortar to...

Lennie Lower, Australia's answer to James Thurber and S.J. Perelman, wrote humorous columns for Smith's Weekly and The Women's Weekly and by 1930 was seen as our greatest humorist with his novel Here's Luck. HERE'S LOWER is a selection of the whimsical...

This book is the third in a series of books written for the Australian militia in 1942, with the threat of imminent Japanese invasion. The author's understanding of Arab tactics during the Desert War and his comprehensive knowledge of the Australian...

Variously called Australia's first modern poet, the father of modern Australian poetry, and "the master craftsman of them all," Kenneth Slessor continues to be admired in Australia and abroad for a comparatively small body of work. Yet one of his...

Harold Larwood’s own version of the great 1932-1933 Ashes cricket series, with full scores and annotated photographs from his own collection. A cricket classic, first published in 1933. Harold Larwood was one of the greatest fast bowlers of all time. But...

This delightful illustrated autobiography is the story of Miles Franklin's first ten years, spent partly on her parent's station in the mountain valley of Brindabella, not far from the present-day Canberra. It is a world of the high places and graceful...

One of the great novels of early settlement in Tasmania, seen through the eyes of the shaman Jangamuttuk, who battles for the survival of his tribe in a world of white ghosts.

Ion Idriess draws on his childhood memories to describe the rise of the mines in this, the best history of Broken Hill and surrounds in the NSW Central West.

Pearl divers & sea rovers in Australian seas.Mr. Idriess reveals to the reader the technique of pearling with him, the reader boards the lugger for the pearling grounds, makes the acquaintance of the skipper and crew, dons the diving dress and...

Idriess latest book is really the romance of the Edie Creek and Bulolo diggings, situated inland from Salamau; and the associated names of diggers as "Shark Eye Bill" (William Park), Matt Crowe, Jim Preston, Arthur Dowling, Frank and Jim Pryke... men who...

Magic realism set in the Mildura area, from the author of Still Life with Allen Keys and Tiger-Wolf. The squawking parrot knows it all, the secret keeper of this land, of wine and river, war and love, and dreams men brought to river bank. Part family...

An Inspector Bonaparte Mystery # 28 featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective. If any man was ever born to be murdered, it was William Lush – a hated drunk who disappeared after beating his wife to death. Plenty of men had the opportunity to murder...

An Inspector Bonaparte Mystery # 18 featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective. Eight hundred kilometres from the sea, Lake Otway is dying. Heat, drought, and thirst-crazed animals take their toll. When Ray Gillen, lucky lottery winner, went for a...

A book for your baby, a month by month record of the first two years of life. You can use it in any way you like, to build up a picture that you and your child will later cherish - a storehouse of unique memories and sometimes vital information. It will...

When Inspector Bonaparte is called to the drought-stricken outback sheep station he finds that two men have been savagely beaten to death. Clues are scarce in this sun-baked, sand-blown country, but Bony’s understanding of the bush and the people who...

An Inspector Bonaparte Mystery # 12 featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective. In the Grampian Mountains, two girl hitch-hikers have disappeared without trace, and the policeman sent to investigate has been murdered. Bonaparte visits the lonely...

An Inspector Bonaparte Mystery # 20 featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective. Detective-Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte is on leave, staying with an old friend near Adelaide. Ben Wickham, a meteorologist whose uncannily accurate weather forecasts had...

An Inspector Bonaparte Mystery # 29 featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective. When Eric Maidstone was found dead near Bore Ten, just west of the Dingo-proof Fence, the first thought of those who discovered his body was that he might have been...

An Inspector Bonaparte Mystery # 21 featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective. Myra Thomas, apparently dressed only in nightgown and slippers, has walked off the train somewhere along the 650 kilometres of track that crosses the Nullarbor Plain...

By the time Frank Pryke's ashes were buried at Samarai in 1937 there was little of Papua New Guinea he had not seen in his search for gold. He, more than any other, could have confirmed the miners' lore: 'There's gold in New Guinea but...

In the wake of the Coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic, the world learned some big lessons. But not enough. Life eventually returned to normal, affluence and profligate activity increased – it was The Best of Times. But then the gap between the Haves and the...

In this witty and entertaining memoir, Alister Kershaw describes the pleasures of his prolonged residence in France - a country of villages - from 1948, when even Paris was a series of villages. In post-war Paris, Kershaw lived a penniless but joyous...

As an authentic picture of life among the head-hunting warriors of the Torres Strait Islands it is probably unsurpassed.There are some who may think that Mr Idriess is giving us simply an imaginative picture, but the author has travelled the Strait with...

Now available for the first time, here is Upfield's own story of tramping Australia and developing his great crime novels featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective, alongside real desert characters like One-Spur Dick, Mr Pluto, Dead March Harry and...

On special assignment with Military Intelligence, Detective-Inspector Bonaparte leaves his familiar Australian outback environment for Melbourne and a nearby mountain resort. Although out of his element with city people, Bony displays his characteristic...

An Inspector Bonaparte Mystery # 11 featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective. A cat... a ping-pong ball... a drunken gardener... With these slight clues to go on Detective-Inspector Bonaparte investigates the mysterious death of famous author,...

An Inspector Bonaparte Mystery # 13 featuring Bony, the first Aboriginal detective. Broome is a little sun-drenched town on the barren north-west coast of Australia, the kind of place where everyone knows everyone else’s business, where all the little...

NAMASTE involves a recognition of the Oneness of forms of art. These are simply aspects of the One. Each moment is really a point from which to view...this and all worlds.

Set in 1920s Sydney, the heyday of Theosophy and other new religions, Towards a Better World explores a time bursting with new and exciting ideas - but also with rumours concerning clergy and young boys.Based on family stories and careful research,...

Originally serialised in 1929, and out of print for 90 years, the book was written within the life spans of people who knew the Kellys – Taylor even interviewed Ned’s brother Jim prior to writing the book, while Ellen Kelly had died only a few years...

Nothing is quite what it seems in this tall tale; dubious science meets equally dubious myth making. The myth of the Tiger-wolf (Thylicine alpine) is it, as they say, a fraud? The fantastic adventures of the “Green Avenger” cartoon hero, drawn by Nat...

In Dr Wooreddy, Mudrooroo has taken his previous themes of (Aboriginal) heritage and identity and melded them into one perception. This is an amazing book.

The extraordinary story of a classic Australian pioneer - told by Australia's 'Boswell of the Bush', Ion Idriess.Almost single-handedly John Flynn of the Australian Inland Mission brought to the outback the Flying Doctor Service and the Bush...

Idriess was a spotter for the famous Australian sniper, Billy Sing, and this book draws on his own experiences in the Gallipoli trenches during World War One. ... Sing had a reputation as an excellent marksman, lurking in the dark and silently sneaking...

The Punjabi migration provides the material for the first Indo-Australian literary work, first published in 1965. Set in northern New South Wales  this is something of a rural idyll, recording a cross-communal marriage and settling in to life on a sheep...