Sunday, June 20, 2021

Michael Palin does fiction

 



Ex-library. Super-mint condition. 261pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.
From the inimitable Michael Palin comes the warm and witty story of an everyman, a tantalising offer, a journey to India and the search for the truth.
Keith Mabbut is at a crossroads in his life. When he is offered the opportunity of a lifetime - to pen the biography of the elusive Hamish Melville, a highly influential activist and humanitarian - he seizes the chance to write something meaningful.
His search to find out the real story behind the legend takes Mabbut to the lush landscapes and environmental hotspots of India.
The more he discovers about Melville, the more he admires him - and the more he connects with an idealist who wanted to make a difference.
But is his quarry really who he claims to be As Keith discovers, the truth can be whatever we make it. . .
In this wonderful, heartwarming novel, Michael Palin turns his considerable skills to fiction in the story of an ordinary man on an extraordinary adventure.
About the Author
Michael Palin established his reputation with MONTY PYTHON'S FLYING CIRCUS and RIPPING YARNS. A self-confessed dromomaniac (travel addict), he has written books to accompany his seven very successful travel series, AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS (1988), POLE TO POLE (1991), FULL CIRCLE (1995), HEMINGWAY ADVENTURE (1999), SAHARA (2001), HIMALAYA (2003) and NEW EUROPE (2007) all available in paperback from Orion. HIMALAYA was the No.1 bestseller for eleven consecutive weeks.

Novel terrorism

 



Ex-library. Mint condition. $15 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Anthology of sh*thouse travel

 


 
Very good condition. PB. 432pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Experience - at comfortable second-hand - a selection on the worst journeys in the world, described by some of the best writers on travel in the world. 'Worst Journeys:' combines reportage, fiction and poetry in an anthology that features many of the best-known writers of our times.

Travels through Japan, China and Russia


 

Excellent condition. PB. 384pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

'I am in exactly the right place, thinking, doing and feeling exactly the right things...'

This was the affirmation that Brad Newsham repeated daily as he cycled alone across the Japanese Alps to Mount Fuji, free to wander wherever he chose. But back home in San Francisco, life hadn't been so rosy: his wife had met someone else and wanted a divorce. He tried everything to change her mind, eventually leaving his job and buying a one-way ticket to Asia in the hope that she would miss him. It worked...and then HE met someone else on a bus in Hong Kong.

One of the first wave of Western backpackers to blaze a trail through China and Russia, Brad Newsham travelled from the neon-lit streets of Tokyo to the epic prairies of Mongolia in a journey that took him across Asia by bicycle, boat, bus and the Trans-Siberian railway. With its rich and fascinating cast of characters, All The Right Places is classic travel writing at its very best. 

A memoir of hilarity

 



Mint condition. PB. 282pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

One of the sweetest memoirs you will ever read

 



Great condition. PB. 214pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.
A beautiful memoir of growing up, discovering your heritage and finding peace with who you are.
Latika Bourke was adopted from India, aged eight months.
Growing up in Bathurst, New South Wales she felt a deep connection to her Australian home and her Australian family.
It wasn't until she heard her name uttered in the hit movie Slumdog Millionaire that Latika recognised she knew nothing of her Indian roots, the world she was born into and what she could have become had she not been brought to Australia as a baby.
As Latika carved out a successful career for herself as an award-winning political journalist, she became more and more curious about her heritage and what it meant to be born in India and raised in Australia.
And so began a deeply personal and sometimes confronting journey back to her birthplace to unravel the mysteries of her heritage.
From India with Love is a beautiful story of finding your place in the world and finding peace with the path that led you there.
About the Author
Latika was born in India and adopted as a baby by an Australian family at eight months. In 2010 Latika was awarded the Walkley Award for Young Journalism, and has since worked as a political reporter for the ABC. She currently reports from London.

The price of blowing the whistle

 



Mint condition. PB. 251pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Award-winning Australian fiction

 



Mint condition. PB. 517pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Travels with refugees

 


Very good condition. PB. 330pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.
National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist Traveling for nearly two years and across four continents, Caroline Moorehead takes readers on a journey to understand why millions of people are forced to abandon their homes, possessions, and families in order to find a place where they may, quite literally, be allowed to live.
Moorehead's experience living and working with refugees puts a human face on the news, providing unforgettable portraits of the refugees she meets in Cairo, Guinea, Sicily, Lebanon, England, Australia, Finland, and at the U.S.-Mexico border.
“Human Cargo" changes our understanding of what it means to have and lose a place in the world, and reveals how the refugee "problem" is on a par with global crises such as terrorism and world hunger.
Caroline Moorehead, a distinguished biographer, has served as a columnist on human rights for "The Times" (London) and "The Independent" (London).
More recently, she has worked directly with African refugees in Cairo as a founder of a legal advice office in addition to raising funds for a range of educational projects.
She is the author of "Gellhorn" and lives in London.
A National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist
In spite of the fact that refugees surround us--recent UN estimates suggest that their numbers approach 20 million--few grasp the scale of their presence.
Moorehead's experience living and working with refugees puts a human face on the news, providing indelible portraits of not only refugees but also the countries from which they fled, as well as those that host them, the men and women who help them, and, finally, those who have not.
Moorehead has traveled for nearly two years and across four continents to bring us these unforgettable stories.
Among others, we learn about Salaam, an Iraqi Catholic persecuted by Saddam Hussein's regime, and his struggle to reach San Diego through Mexico with his sister; and Mary, a fifty-year-old American who works with the International Rescue Committee in Guinea to provide schooling for refugees from Iran who escaped a Tehran prison to establish a trauma center in England for victims of torture.
Moorehead illustrates why the "problem" of 20 million people stuck in limbo--unable to work, educate their children, or otherwise contribute to society--is on a par with global crises such as terrorism and world hunger.
“It is Moorehead's sensitivity to . . . historical circumstances and political contingencies--not to mention her considerable skills as a writer and storyteller--that makes her book such a vital contribution to debates over migration . . . She differs from those showy journalists of alarm who view the distress of others as an opportunity for overwrought prose and self-display . . . S]he is devoted to the quiet narration of disquieting fact . . . If her brief is universal, her eye and ear are local, attuned and affixed to the toll of state policies and their historical context. Inevitably, she brings to mind the great Martha Gellhorn, the subject of her last biography, whose 'small, still voice' carried a 'barely contained fury and indignation at the injustice of fate and man against the poor, the weak, the dispossessed.'"- The Nation

A primer on Islam and modernity

 




Rare book. Slightly damaged. PB. 309pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.
Most of the problems visible in the Muslim world stem from the gap created by a commitment to tradition and a wariness of modernity.
This book outlines the defining beliefs of Islam and the devotional practices of Muslims. It explains how and why the Islamic mood and the Muslim mind competes and, at times, conflicts with the promotion of modern popular culture and the propagation of contemporary liberal values.
The author, well-known Muslim theologian and writer Mehmet Özalp, is adamant that constructive and respectful dialogue across religious traditions is possible and that a clash of civilisations can be avoided.
He writes with sensitivity and insight about Islamic theology, history and social engagement, seeking to identify the major fault lines in relations between the Muslim World and the West while offering creative suggestions to relieve tension and restore goodwill.
This book will educate and enlighten a very broad readership and will help to fashion a future that neither rejects tradition nor resists modernity.

Classic interviews with Andrew Denton

 



Mint condition. PB. 341pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.
Enough Rope is a highly acclaimed, award-winning program that is still as intelligent and provocative as ever.
Andrew Denton's amicable spotlight has honed in on an eclectic array of celebrities, personalities, politicians, activists, artists, musicians and 'unsung' ordinary people, all with their own compelling stories to tell.
Enough Rope 3 contains highlights from the 2005 season. It presents 25 noteworthy interviews including Peter Cundall, Jack Thompson, Cate Blanchett, Geraldine Brooks, Stephen Page, Bob Geldof, Natalie Imbruglia, Michael Stipe, the three shearers and many more.
Also included are the compelling show and tell segments along with contributions from members of the viewing public.

Life as a brothel receptionist ...

 



Excellent condition. PB. 367pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.
This behind-the-scenes look at life in a brothel is a wonderfully funny tale, told with a lively sense of the absurd and a rare and forgiving understanding of human frailty.
'I have several young busty blondes, Derek,' Ruth sang like the weathergirl. 'One is a very sexy Danish girl, just back from a skiing trip, five-foot-five, long wavy blonde hair, blue eyes, twenty-five years old. A fantastic figure: thirty-six, twenty-five, thirty-five. Or I have a more demure, very pretty, young strawberry blonde Australian, Derek. She's nineteen . . .'
When her acting career stalls, Merridy Eastman lands a challenging role: night receptionist at a Sydney brothel. A long way from the bright lights of a TV studio, she is swept into the high drama of the sex industry.
This former Play School presenter learns words for items and acts she never imagined, she opens the door to first-timers, old hands, couples and the occasional celebrity.
But the place she spends every moment she can is the kitchen table, having a cup of tea and discussing investment portfolios, and life's many great mysteries, with Sapphire, Shelby, Antoinette and Bree - the women who make a living from having sex with strangers. And then, in this most unlikely of places, she finds herself falling in love . . .
There's a Bear in There (and he wants Swedish) is a funny, fascinating and near-as-dammit true account of a forbidden world, told with a lively sense of the absurd and a rare and forgiving understanding of human frailty.
About Merridy Eastman
A NIDA graduate, Merridy Eastman has performed in a swag of productions for the Melbourne and Sydney Theatre Companies and spent several summers leaping about botanical gardens across Australia, bringing Shakespeare to the masses.
She has had major roles in most current soap operas, playing everything from a cradle-snatching golf fanatic on Neighbours to an unstable funeral director on Blue Heelers who was so unhappy with a bad haircut, she stabbed the hairdresser with his scissors. She also played the neurotic Eileen Unn on Channel Seven's Always Greener.
But despite this varied and illustrious career, Merridy has come to accept that for generations of kiddies she will always be Merridy-from-Play School thanks to a five-year stint on the show in the 1980s.

Biography of a football legend

 



Mint condition. PB. 376pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Biography of a Beatle

 



Mint condition. PB. 493pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Andrew Denton's classic interviews with Elders

 



Excellent condition. PB. 259pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

SOLD An Australian couple's account of life in Goa, India's Portuguese heartland

 


SOLD

Rare book. Excellent condition. PB. 304pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

SOLD Travels in the Indian SubContinent

 







SOLD

William Dalrymple is a Scottish travel writer, journalist and historian with a special interest in the Indian subcontinent. This book is a rare Indian edition of some of his best work on Indian history and travel. 

HB. 323pp. $30 including postage anywhere in Australia.

SOLD The Great Indian Mutiny


 

SOLD

My direct ancestor, Mirza Ghalib, was the poet laureate of the last Mughal Emperor who led (or was forced to lead) the great mutiny from his depleted palace in Delhi in 1857.

This book is the US edition of the English original which was entitled The Sound Of Fury - An Account Of The Indian Mutiny (1963). It provides a day-by-day chronological account of the Mutiny which is seen by many as the beginning of the independence movement of India.. Both sides ended up with plenty of blood on their hands.

This is a very rare edition of the book. An antique in excellent condition apart from the previous owner's surname written on the inside cover. 

$25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

HB. 384pp.