Oceania Books

This is a great map of New Zealand. Its unfortunate that it is becoming hard to find.

The map was printed a few years ago, so some things have changed, but for 95% of the areas you would be traveling to it is very accurate. Most of the changes are not the addition or changing of streets but rather the condition of the roads. Many roads that are said to be unsealed are now sealed, especially in the North Island.

The map is also made out of a plastic type material that is waterproof. You could dump a bucket of water on the map and it would still be fine, maybe just cleaner! Wish they made all maps out of this material.

Great map if you can find it, and its worth the hunt!

Inglis took 15 years to write this book. The book has been written in easy to read non-academic style that makes for easy access by the casual reader. I read this book with ease finding it full of useful and interesting facts. Inglis does not attempt to analyse the theory behind memory or memory representation but does allow enough material for the investigative reader to develop his or her own thesis.

In short it is a long book, but a good book and certainly one that helps to remind us that there are those that we should not forget.

Just like the book says it is full of photographic pictures. Outstanding scenery and beautiful people. Author & photographer did an excellent job in portraying the Samoan lifestyle, custom, family, etc.

This very un-PC book is an account of a 1920-21 circumnavigation of the world in a 99-foot power-yacht (state-of-art for the time) by a wealthy Chicago cement-magnate and his wife and crew.

Different cultures are encountered, bad weather, risky close-calls, hard conditions and ofcourse, exotic, faraway locales (many decades before Club Med and Hotel Chains spread worldwide)----All aptly and vividly described by Australian writer Dale Collins, who was onboard for the majority of the voyage.
The book is a window into another era. The reader can't help appreciate the changes that have swept the world since, some good, some bad.
This book comes from a time when there were still parts of the world that were relatively unexplored and mysterious.

If you like Sea-Tales, epsecially true ones, this is a volume
you shouldn't miss.

This collection of twelve original essays examines contemporary seafaring practices and the unique relationship of the islanders to the sea. The book adds a new dimension to present scholarship on the Pacific Islands by focusing on ordinary people and their attachment to the sea in the course of daily life rather than on the spectacular exploits of long-distance voyagers. Contributors to the volume examine islanders who depend on the sea for food and transportation, who paddle their canoes or fire up their outboard motors to transport copra to the local trader, whose songs and dances depict maritime themes, and for whom the sea provides a metaphor for all the vagaries of life. Geographical coverage of the book includes one Micronesian community (Enewetak), three Polynesian communities (Nukumanu, Sikaiana, and Rotuma), and four Melanesian ones (Marovo in the Western Solomons, Omarakana and Kaduwaga in the Trobriands, and Vanatinai in the Louisiade Archipelago). An essay on the Bugis of Indonesia points out the relevance of Island Southeast Asia to understanding seafaring in Oceania.--Book cover description

I picked this book up because I'm freezing this winter in Chicago, and a book about a far-away island sounded nice. I was pleasantly surprised by how well-read the author is, historically. His experiences on this island are both funny and obviously true.

This book is well-written and, unlike many other travelogues I've read, gives the I-Kiribati (the people of the island) the kind of cultural respect they deserve. The author's way of putting words together is clever and upbeat. I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a light read with some meat to it.

The Ship brings to life Captain Cook's famous voyage of exploration to the South Pacific aboard the square-rigged ship Endeavour. Between August and October 2001 a volunteer crew, sailing an exact replica of Cook's ship, retraced the most perilous stretch of the original voyage from the Great Barrier Reef (off the east coast of Australia) to Indonesia. This book tells the story of Cook's journey through the experience of the modern crew. Featuring original drawings, maps, and artworks, plus spectacular new photographs. I promise you'll enjoy it!

Mark Shand, brother of Camilla Parker Bowles, has written a short and very entertaining account of a
brief sojourn by canoe upriver into the interior of New Guinea (the western portion belonging to
Indonesia). Along with his two British travelling companions, he has various adventures, trades for
curious objects (including skulls), and admires the landscape, the fauna, and the tribal inhabitants.
It is a wonderfully engaging book, filled with good humor.

At first I found this book somewhat difficult to use. The cross-indexing of the numbers assigned to each hotel was confusing. Nevertheless, I found this book to be invaluable. Detailed descriptions (often more than one page) of reasonably priced small hotels are grouped together by the section in Sydney in which they are located. By contrast, most guidebooks provide two or three sentence descriptions of hotels with little sense of where they are located. Small Hotels of Sydney gives the reader a working knowledge of the area in which hotels are located and how close they are to public transportation, including transportation to and from the airport. There are descriptions of what each hotel's rooms are like as well as the amenities offered.

I read this book carefully and felt I was making an informed decision about where my hotel was located, how convenient it would be for me, the quality of the hotel and what my room would be like. I selected the Madison Hotel in Kings Cross.The hotel room and location were exactly as described and met my needs, which included reasonable cost, perfectly.

If price is no object and you're staying in a top hotel, there's no need to bother with this book. If, on the other hand, money is an object and you want value for it, this book can give you the means of selecting an hotel within your price range that meets your needs. A vacation can be ruined or compromised by the selection of the wrong hotel. Small Hotels of Sydney minimizes the chances of making this mistake. Considering the cost and time involved in getting to Australia, this book is a bargain.

Mr. Budnick's historical review of the United States "takover" of the Hawaiian Islands unearths the all-too-familiar tale of political intrigue and corruption. This book provides an insider's view of the imperialistic fashion in which the missionaries, large ranch/farming interests, military fanatics and their political cronies collaborated against the Hawiian cultural and political system. It also explains the efforts of native Hawaiians to prevent these actions. Essentially, "Stolen Kingdom" is the non-fiction version of James A. Michener's "Hawaii". I learned much from this well-documented book; and most notably, of the various factions in the US and Hawaii involved in usurping power from the indigenous locals. I recommend this informative writing to all Americans as a primer for Hawaiian Political History.