Silly politics

 

This copy has been well-loved. It isn't exactly in mint condition but it isn't falling apart either. It is a book you would buy for its content and for a good laugh. A real collector's item.

PB. 528pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

'We have had diaries from other Cabinet Ministers, but none I think which have been quite so illuminating... It is a fascinating diary... It is shorter than Barbara Castle's... and although it is rather more accurate than Dick Crossman's, it is distinctly funnier' - Lord Allen of Abbeydale (formerly Permanent Secretary at the Home Office) in The Times

'It has an entertainment and educational value which is unique. It is uproariously funny and passes the acid test of becoming more amusing at every subsequent reading... I will go so far as to claim that in the characters of Jim Hacker and Sir Humphrey Appleby, Messrs Lynn and Jay have created something as immortal as P.G. Wodehouse's Bertie Wooster and Jeeves' - Brian Walden in The Standard

A critique of criminal law and justice

 

Ex-library. Very good condition. HB. 368pp. 

At a time when the crime rate has reached new peaks, criminal justice isn't working. It is no good at convicting criminals, and even worse at dealing with those it does convict. Meanwhile, the national debate about crime and criminal justice becomes even more shrill, and its participants mired ever deeper in archaic cliche.

IN THE NAME OF THE LAW challenges equally the ebbing shibboleths of the liberal left, and the terrifying revenge justice of the right. It asks what can be learned about our society from the way it treats its criminals and organises its policemen. The book concludes that criminal justice provides the starkest pointer to a twenty-first-century hell: a two-thirds/one-third society, with the comfortable defending themselves against a desperate minority with guns and fortifications. Rose argues that these are measures which can be taken to avoid the Los Angeles-like world we seem to be creating.

About the author

David Rose is a writer and investigative journalist. 

His awards include the David Watt Memorial Prize and the One World award for human rights journalism. 

His work appears in The Observer and Vanity Fair. 

Among his books are In the Name of the Law, a widely-praised examination of the British criminal justice system; and A Climate of Fear, an investigation of the Broadwater Farm case and the conviction of Winston Silcott. 

He has also written books on mountaineering, including Regions of the Heart, a biography of Alison Hargreaves, the British climber who died in her attempt to conquer K2, and he is working on a book about the US death penalty centred on a miscarriage of justice in the town of Columbus, Georgia. 

David Rose lives in Oxford with his family.

Developing your personal brand

 

Mint condition. PB. 286pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Being You teaches you everything you need to know about personal branding.

A personal brand tells the world about who you are as a human being personally and professionally.

It's about authenticity and is derived exclusively from your mind, your heart, your values, your passions, and what you believe to be true at the core of your personal and professional self.

That's why it's unique - because it begins with and is created from you.

Whether you are the leader of an organization or team, engaged in creative work, in transition and changing your job, searching for a new career, going for a job interview, giving an important speech or presentation, wanting to network more effectively, or lobbying for a public position, this book will provide you with the toolkit to develop a confident personal brand.

Being You shows you how to communicate your business and increase your brand awareness, both face to face and on digital platforms, including a comprehensive social media strategy.

It provides practical tips to reach your target audience and land your message, while sharing the secrets of some of the world's biggest personal brands - from Oprah Winfrey to Roger Federer - on how they grew their audiences and achieved success.

It's practical, authoritative, inspirational and illustrated with stories and case studies based on Maggie's own international work and experience.

About the Author

Maggie Eyre is an internationally recognized expert in personal presence and leadership motivation, with over 30 years’ experience in business, public relations and performance.

She has trained many senior business executives, public figures and academics to harness their maximum potential and shine with authentic voice and action, and her career is focused on showing clients how to think and act as a personal brand.

Her previous book, Speak Easy: The Essential Guide to Speaking in Public (Exisle Publishing) is sold around the world.

An encyclopaedia of Australian jokes

 

Very good condition. PB. 570pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Ideal for those hoping to perform at Edinburgh Fringe next year. Just joking.

SOLD Real life stories from the People's Republic of China

 

SOLD

Excellent condition. PB. 325pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

The Corpse Walker is a collection of twenty-seven extraordinary interviews that opens a window, unlike any other, onto the lives of ordinary, often outcast, Chinese men and women.

Liao Yiwu reconstructs conversations he had between 1990 and 2008 with a range of remarkable people: a professional mourner, a human trafficker, a leper, an abbot, a retired government official, a former landowner, a mortician, a feng shui master, a former Red Guard, a political prisoner, a village teacher, a blind street musician, a Falun Gong practitioner and a corpse walker.

The result is an idiosyncratic, powerful and dignified portrait of a people, a time and a place we might otherwise have never known.

SOLD Afghanistan's history repeating the present

 

SOLD

Mint condition. PB. 567pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

A towering history of the first Afghan War by bestselling historian William Dalrymple

In the spring of 1839, the British invaded Afghanistan for the first time.

Led by lancers in scarlet cloaks and plumed shakos, nearly 20,000 British and East India Company troops poured through the high mountain passes and re-established on the throne Shah Shuja ul-Mulk.

On the way in, the British faced little resistance. But after two years of occupation, the Afghan people rose in answer to the call for jihad and the country exploded into violent rebellion.

The First Anglo-Afghan War ended in Britain's greatest military humiliation of the nineteenth century: an entire army of the then most powerful nation in the world ambushed in retreat and utterly routed by poorly equipped tribesmen.

Return of a King is the definitive analysis of the First Afghan War, told through the lives of unforgettable characters on all sides and using for the first time contemporary Afghan accounts of the conflict.

Prize-winning and bestselling historian William Dalrymple's masterful retelling of Britain's greatest imperial disaster is a powerful and important parable of colonial ambition and cultural collision, folly and hubris, for our times.

About the Author

William Dalrymple is the bestselling author of In Xanadu, City of Djinns, From the Holy Mountain, The Age of Kali, White Mughals, The Last Mughal and, most recently, Nine Lives.

He has won the Thomas Cook Travel Book Award, the Sunday Times Young British Writer of the Year Award, the French Prix d'Astrolabe, the Wolfson Prize for History, the Scottish Book of the Year Award, the Duff Cooper Memorial Prize, the Asia House Award for Asian Literature, the Vodafone Crossword Award and has three times been longlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize.

In 2012 he was appointed Whitney J. Oates Visiting Fellow in Humanities at Princeton University.

He lives with his wife and three children on a farm outside Delhi.

Why Australia is all class ...

 

Excellent condition. PB. 339pp. New & Revised Edition. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

AUSTRALIA IS A CLASSLESS SOCIETY . . . OR IS IT?

In this timely revision of an important and groundbreaking book Class in Australia well known writer and social commentator Craig McGregor re-examines contemporary Australian society and discovers that an upper, middle and working class, and a growing underclass, are still firmly in place.

Class in Australia considers the history and membership of each class, and the determinants of class, including occupation, wealth and family background.

Politics is bound up with class in Australia. Craig McGregor puts under the microscope the increasing defection of the working class from its traditional ally the ALP, and the growing dissatisfaction of the middle classes with both major parties.

Classic studies of class are reinforced with profiles of individuals in this thought-provoking and provocative text.

Class in Australia is a must have for all those with an interest in Australian society and where it is heading. It is a book that should be read by every Australian.

SOLD Essays on Irish history in one volume

 

SOLD

Rare book. Ex-library. Immaculate condition. PB. 248pp. $35 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Was there an Irish Revolution, and - if so - what kind of revolution was it? What motivated revolutionaries and those who supported them? How was the war fought and ended? What have been the repercussions for unionists, women and modern Irish politics?

These questions are here addressed by leading historians of the period through both detailed assessments of specific incidents and wide-ranging analysis of key themes. The Irish Revolution, 1913-1923 provides the most up-to-date answers to, and debate on, the fundamental questions relating to this formative period in Irish history.

Clear coverage of the historiography and a detailed chronology make this book ideal for classroom use. The Irish Revolution is essential reading for students and scholars of modern Ireland, and for all those interested in the study of revolution.

Humorous anecdotes about a great Australian Prime Minister from one of his colleagues

 

Excellent condition. PB. 352pp. $15 including postage anywhere in Australia.

All the bizarre Gough anecdotes from Life With Gough plus the hilarious Gough tales from Whitlam to Winston, with lots of new Gough stories from the indefatigable Barry Cohen.

The man can't help it. Self-parody, sending up other people's expectations, a love of the absurd. Gough's still going strong. To mark another birthday (and in response to popular demand) we've brought together Life With Gough and the best of Whitlam to Winston with some great newly minted Gough stories to present a bumper edition of The (almost) Complete Gough.

So, once again, here's a larger-than-life Australian, infuriatingly high-falutin' and bizarrely prurient, inflating himself above politics, enjoying himself hugely at the expense of the mean-spirited, the pompous, the ingratiating, the serious and the dull.

'Here is an agreeable and welcome mix of irreverence, wit and absurdity. Here is captured some of the moods and interests that had tenancy in the Whitlam mind - the imperious, the classical, the historical, the rompish, the waggish and the outrageously provocative.' - James Killen

'Anyone who has ever struggled to suppress mirth during a church service understands the pleasure to be found in sharing Barry Cohen's witty, irreverent but affectionate anecdotes. Don't tell Gough.' - The Hon. Kim Beazley.

About the author

Barry Cohen has observed Gough Whitlam closely for almost 30 years, for 21 of those years (1969-90) as a member of the federal parliament, and for four as Minister for the Arts, Heritage and the Environment (in the first and second Hawke Governments). The (almost) Complete Gough is his eighth book.

SOLD A political manifesto of one of Australia's greatest Prime Ministers

 

SOLD

Mint condition. HB. 267pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Over his career, former PM Malcolm Fraser has given a number of public addresses that have demonstrated an inspiring commitment to social justice across a range of issues, including reconciliation. This volume includes a series of speeches and other writings by Fraser on many current issues, both internal and global.

Malcolm Fraser believes passionately that, whatever our politics, humanitarian issues are the 'common ground' we all share. Here his thoughtful and often provocative analysis of issues ranging from the role of the United Nations to globalisation, from multiculturalism to the urgent need for reconciliation, reveals a man who cares deeply about Australia, its people and its place in the world. 

An hilarious set of columns by Howard Jacobson

 

Mint condition. PB. 368pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

It takes a particular kind of man to want an embroidered polo player astride his left nipple. Occasionally, when I am tired and emotional, or consumed with self-dislike, I try to imagine myself as someone else, a wearer of Yarmouth shirts and fleecy sweats, of windbreakers and rugged Tyler shorts, of baseball caps with polo players where the section of the brain that concerns itself with aesthetics is supposed to be. But the hour passes. Good men return from fighting Satan in the wilderness the stronger for their struggle, and so do I.

The winner of the 2010 Man Booker Prize, Howard Jacobson, brims with life in this collection of his most acclaimed journalism. 

From the unusual disposal of his father-in-law's ashes and the cultural wasteland of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang to the melancholy sensuality of Leonard Cohen and desolation of Wagner's tragedies, Jacobson writes with all the thunder and joy of a man possessed. 

Absurdity piles upon absurdity, and glorious sentences weave together to create a hilarious, heartbreaking and uniquely human collection. This book is not just a series of parts, but an irresistible, unputdownable sum which triumphantly out-Thurbers Thurber.

About the Author

An award-winning writer and broadcaster, Howard Jacobson was born in Manchester, brought up in Prestwich and was educated at Stand Grammar School in Whitefield, and Downing College, Cambridge, where he studied under F. R. Leavis. 

He lectured for three years at the University of Sydney before returning to teach at Selwyn College, Cambridge. 

His novels include The Mighty Walzer (winner of the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize), Kalooki Nights (longlisted for the Man Booker Prize) the highly acclaimed The Act of Love and, most recently, the Man Booker Prize 2010-winning The Finkler Question. Howard Jacobson lives in London.

The story of a criminal lawyer turned criminal

Mint condition. PB. 256pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

From 1975 to 2001, Andrew Fraser was a leading criminal solicitor with a successful national practice. Then it all went horribly wrong. 

In 1999 he was charged with being knowingly concerned with the importation of a commercial quantity of cocaine. Fraser pleaded guilty to a charge of possessing, trafficking a small quantity, and using cocaine over a period of time. He was sentenced to seven years in maximum security prison. 

Court in the Middle describes his early years - growing up in a family of lawyers, running hard to build a criminal law practice; his successful years with a national practice, and defending high profile, sometimes notorious, clients. 

He also discusses his relationship with cocaine, addiction and deals, crime and punishment, and the shocking details of his time spent in a maximum security prison.

Biography of a philanthropist who founded St Vincent de Paul in Australia

 

Mint condition. PB. 288pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

The extraordinary life of 'Captain' Charles Gordon O'Neill - colonial engineer, inventor, parliamentarian, philanthropist, and principle co-founder of the St Vincent de Paul Society in Australia and New Zealand.

The extraordinary saga of the colonial character 'Captain' Charles Gordon O'Neill an, engineer, inventor, parliamentarian and philanthropist.

Born of Irish parents in Scotland in 1828, O'Neill travelled to the colonies in 1863 with driving ambition, matched by entrepreneurial vision. 

A brilliant engineer, he helped create town plans, railway routes and tramways across New Zealand. Elected to the New Zealand parliament as a goldfields MP, he warned of the risk of climate change from destroying forests. 

He moved to Sydney in 1881 to work for the poor of Australia. Beginning in Sydney's wild Rocks district, he pioneered many charitable initiatives and established the St Vincent de Paul Society in New South Wales. 

His foresight was vindicated as the colonial age of gold was followed by the economic depression of the 1890s. In a bitter twist of fate, despite all his technical skill, access to capital and political connections, O'Neill died a pauper amid the slums of The Rocks in 1900.

'a fascinating, meticulously researched and detailed study of the life of Charles O'Neill The themes of personal sacrifice in the cause of social justice and the fight against poverty are universal and still contemporary.'

Professor John Warhurst, The Australian National University

'Utick rescues a singularly intriguing character from undeserved obscurity; and in so doing makes an important and fresh contribution to the written histories of New Zealand and Australia. This is an elegant and informative narrative that should appeal to a wide readership.'

Associate Professor Hugh Laracy, The University of Auckland

SOLD Travels in Afghanistan

 

SOLD

Excellent condition. PB. 496pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

An Unexpected Light, Travels in Afghanistan was greeted on publication by universal critical acclaim and is now widely acknowledged as the most influential contemporary work of Afghanistan. Written on the eve of 9/11, at the height of Afghanistan’s isolation from the world, Jason Elliot’s uncannily prescient account of his winter journey through the country torn by civil war is as pertinent today as it was then.

Winner of the Thomas Cook/Daily Telegraph Travel Book Award in the UK and a New York Times Bestseller in the USA, it recounts the author’s daring and passionate investigation into an extraordinary culture, first as a clandestine guest of the mujahiddin during the Soviet occupation, and ten years later during the Taliban advance on the besieged capital, Kabul.

This new edition of An Unexpected Light is illustrated with the author’s photographs and celebrates a classic work of travel literature.

‘Jason Elliot is that rare traveller who surrenders himself to people and places and this tale is a many-layered reconstruction of his experience . . . I am sure this book will soon be among the classics of travel’ - Doris Lessing

‘An Unexpected Light is often unexpectedly funny and constantly perceptive, but it is also profound’ - New York Times

‘What raises the book to the level of a classic is its intensely personal meditation on the magic of unplanned adventure, of the pain and pleasure of pushing into the unknown. The whole book, like Elliot’s travels themselves, operated on this heightened level’ - The Times

Vintage historical profiles with a humorous twist

 

Vintage collection. Pre-loved and in mint condition. HB. 886pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Published in 1952 and authored by a Dutch-American writer. More details about this book here.

Being a true and faithful account of a number of highly interesting meetings with certain historical personages, from CONFUCIUS and PLATO to VOLTAIRE and THOMAS JEFFERSON, about whom we had always felt a great deal of curiosity and who came to us as our dinner guests in a bygone year. Written and illustrated by Hendrik Willem Van Loon.

Spike Milligan's Old Testament

 

Mint condition. PB. 186pp. $15 including postage anywhere in Australia.

In the Bible, according to author: In the beginning God created the Heaven and Earth and darkness was upon the face of the deep; this was due to a malfunction at Lots Road Power Station... And God said 'Let there be light'. This title presents the author's version of the best known biblical stories.

A war over football

 

Excellent condition. PB. 240pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Part diary and part reportage, The Soccer War is a remarkable chronicle of war in the late twentieth century. 

Between 1958 and 1980, working primarily for the Polish Press Agency, Kapuscinski covered twenty-seven revolutions and coups in Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East. 

Here, with characteristic cogency and emotional immediacy, he recounts the stories behind his official press dispatches—searing firsthand accounts of the frightening, grotesque, and comically absurd aspects of life during war. 

The Soccer War is a singular work of journalism.