Australia Books

This a brilliantly written book - up there amongst the better Wilbur Smith books. The writing is rich, the characters well developed, the subject matter material intriguing - it's based on real events - the building of the Uganda railway across the wilds of Kenya in the late 17th century.

It touches on some of the material used in the Val Kilmer/Michael Douglas film "The Ghost and the Darkness" however, while that film merged characters and falsified the relationships that Preston and Patterson and Turk had with their men and the natives to make it fit into a 2 hr film, this novel deals with these pioneers and their first forays into the Afican wilderness with a team of reluctant Indian rail workers. It's them against the elements and themselves, with the deadline of an imminent war, men who simply want to abandon the whole thing and go home (a place many wont see for several years while they are contracted to complete the railway - nor can they afford the passage if they could - to either England or India). It also looks at how Preston's wife survived it all - the only woman in a rail work gang of 4000.

Great story.
Really.

This book is a very good addition to the literature in the broad area and the only one of it's type on the Australian situation.

A unique contribution and a must for all students of the area.

This is an excellent book....To me, loss of vision would be the worst disability to suffer.

Janet lost one eye as a baby due to cancer, and was told she would lose vision in the other eye in the near future. She was put into a blind school (which had a red door) when she was a child, and didn't understand why she was there. She was 33 when she finally lost her other eye - it had finally succumbed to the aggressive radiation that she was given as a child.

Janet was also adopted as a baby, and wanted to find her natural parents to see if the retinoblastoma was hereditary. When she was 18, she met her mother, who said she didn't want anything to do with her. Her father is a high-profile media personality in Australia. He finally accepted Janet as his daughter, and they now keep in regular contact.

This book is about Janet's journey through her childhood, and into adulthood with a vision disability. Worthwhile reading.

I highly recommend this superb illustrated look at the Powerhouse Museum's collection of Central Asian arts and crafts. Included in this large 80-page book are color photographs of rugs, dresses, coats, headcoverings, jewelry, embroidery, architectural drawings, glass pottery, horse covers, bags, Uzbeks, Kazakhs, and Turkmens. The handcrafted items possess a rich treasure-trove of complex geometric forms and designs. The images are accompanied by helpful introductory texts by Christina Sumner and Heleanor Feltham concerning the history and culture of Central Asian peoples and a large map of the Silk Road routes. The selected bibliography lists 22 books and 4 websites where one can explore Central Asian traditions further.

Beyond the Wild Shores catapults us back to a time when women not only had to work hard at the career of their choice but to work hard justifying having a career outside traditional roles. I love Baily Templeton, who is mistakenly hired as a Head Master of the rugged, Out-back colony of Sydney Cove. Her determination and love for teaching soon win the hearts of those she's seeking to reach as well as those that she is not seeking to reach--the handsome Captain Grant Hogan who is reluctantly but irrersistably drawn to her gentle gumption. Wonderfully inspirational. I loved it!

This is an excellent analysis of Australian bicycling history, written with an Western Australian emphasis, it is a well written, properly reasearched and thoroughly fascinating gem. It covers mainly the heroic exploits but also offers some analysis of the equipment, conditions, and technological issues. Huge amount of marvellous black and white photos. One of the the few books to properly explore the sociological aspects: public servants, shearers transport etc. If you're Australian and own a bike, then this book is a must.

The sort of book you can't put down once you get started, particularly if business, marketing and sport interest you, Written as an autobiography, in an honest if sometimes basic style, nevertheless a very fascinating & gripping tale of the Olympic selection saga, from getting agreement with Melbourne over one Aussie bid, to competing with other major cities - from Manchester to Beijing.

I myself have been in the health industry for approximately 18years and have seen books come and go. This is a wonderfully refreshing "No bull" sort of health book. It reads very nicely and what I love most is the real stories and facts that are given. It makes to really relate to what he is telling you. And with the meal plan and other guides in there, it really makes it a fat loss guide as well as a book for good references regarding health. It sold me.

Big Rain Coming is the kind of picture book teachers dream about. It deals with a culture and situation unfamiliar to most of us, but these are revealed as natural background, natural characters, natural situations. The one thing Big Rain Coming does not reek of is the 'shove it down your throat' cross-cultural drudge that is found in far too many books written for young children.
Big Rain Coming tells a beautiful story with incredible lyrical simplicity.
As an author, simplicity is the hardest of all to master. Germein has done it beautifully here.
The location, the characters are wonderfully authentic and I know, because I've lived and worked in such places too.
Big Rain Coming is a wonderful book to use when teaching because all children can relate to the feeling of waiting for rain, yet they can compare many aspects of the people's lives to their own and see huge differences as well as the many similarities.
The artwork is beautiful, although I'm not a great fan of Bronwyn Bancroft's work. It is unfortunate that because she is a well-known artist, much of the acclaim for the book has been directed towards the illustrator, and not the author who created this brilliant piece of literature.
It doesn't get any better than this.

Australian birder Sean Dooley describes his Big Year, an effort to break the record for the most birds seen in Australia (and environs) in a year.

I loved this birding memoir. Dooley is a lively, humorous, engaging writer, and his Australian slang makes his voice particularly come alive, at least for this American reader. He conveys a passion for his pursuit and a concern for wildlife and the environment without sanctimony.

Clearly, there are scads of awesome birds in Australia, and undoubtedly they have the best common names of any birds anywhere. The species list at the back of the book is an entertainment in itself.

I am at a loss, however, to explain Mr. Dooley's difficulty in finding women who bird. Maybe it's a cultural thing?

Definitely recommended, especially for American readers to whom the language and most of the species will be engagingly exotic.