Hilarious read from HG Nelson

 

Rare and very silly book. Mint condition. 220pp. $15 including postage anywhere in Australia.

"When I gave my tradesman, Larry Fortensky, the shove, I knew the press would pounce with razor-sharp fangs bared. And apart from that marvellous Michael Jackson, the media have never understood my needs, or indeed cared. And, to be honest, I don't give a wobbly plop about any of them. But when I needed something to bury the bounce in while the tabloid frenzy hot-footed around me, this book was just the ticket. So if you find yourself at a loose end, take the plunge into 'Petrol, Bait, Ammo & Ice'. You'll get set all over and weather the stink." (words from Liz Taylor - parfumiere)

A hilarious collection of anecdotes and jokes from H G Nelson, with a foreword by Roy Slaven.

Fighting for football and freedom

 

Mint condition. PB. 368pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

How people power challenged two monarchies, a military junta, and the world's largest sporting institutions ... and won

Football is the world game. It unites. At a grassroots level it creates communities and, in 2019, those communities helped save the life of one of its own.

In 2012, Hakeem al-Araibi was a promising young player on Bahrain's national football team when he was arrested for attacking a police station during the Arab Spring, despite television footage showing him playing soccer at the time of the alleged attack. After three months of torture and wrongful imprisonment, Hakeem was released. He fled the country and made his way to Australia, where he was granted refugee status. Hakeem made a life here and was playing for the suburban Pascoe Vale Football Club, in Melbourne. He thought he was safe.

But, in November 2018, on a holiday to Thailand with his wife, Hakeem was again arrested. The Bahraini government wanted to extradite him to face a ten-year jail sentence, or worse. What happened next shows the best of what soccer can do, and the worst the governing body of FIFA brings. If it wasn't for the Australian soccer community and former Socceroo Craig Foster, Hakeem may never have been freed.

This powerful memoir reveals how a local soccer legend fought tirelessly to help bring home a man he'd never met. From Pascoe Vale to Switzerland, Canberra to Thailand, Foster raised his voice and tens of thousands of Australians were galvanised to #FreeHakeem. Foster lobbied FIFA and the United Nations and worked with human rights organisations worldwide to enable Hakeem's safe return to his wife in Australia.

Despite being from different backgrounds, religions and generations, Craig Foster and Hakeem al-Araibi are united forever through their love of the world game and their fight for freedom.

SOLD The Art of Travel

 

SOLD

Mint condition. PB. 272pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Publisher's blurb ...

The perfect antidote to those guides that tell us what to do when we get there, The Art of Travel tries to explain why we really went in the first place - and helpfully suggests how we might be happier on our journeys.

The Art of Travel is Alain de Botton's travel guide with a difference.
Few activities seem to promise us as much happiness as going travelling: taking off for somewhere else, somewhere far from home, a place with more interesting weather, customs and landscapes. But although we are inundated with advice on where to travel to, we seldom ask why we go and how we might become more fulfilled by doing so.

With the help of a selection of writers, artists and thinkers - including Flaubert, Edward Hopper, Wordsworth and Van Gogh - Alain de Botton's bestselling The Art of Travel provides invaluable insights into everything from holiday romance to hotel mini-bars, airports to sight-seeing.

'Richly evocative, sharp and funny. De Botton proves himself to be a very fine travel writer indeed' Sunday Telegraph

'Delightful, profound, entertaining, I doubt if de Botton has written a dull sentence in his life' Jan Morris

'An elegant and subtle work, unlike any other. Beguiling' Colin Thubron, The TimesThe Art of Travel is Alain de Botton's travel guide with a difference.

Alain de Botton's bestselling books include Essays in Love; The Romantic Movement; Kiss and Tell; StatusAnxiety; How Proust Can Change Your Life;The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work; The Art of Travel; The Architecture of Happiness and Religion for Atheists. He lives in London and founded The School of Life (www.theschooloflife.com) and Living Architecture (www.living-architecture.co.uk). For more information, consult www.alaindebotton.com.

SOLD Exploring the Jewish thread of Africa

 

SOLD

Rare book. Mint condition. PB. 400pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

In a mixture of travel, adventure, and scholarship, historian Tudor Parfitt sets out in search of answers to a fascinating ethnological puzzle: is the Lemba tribe of Southern Africa really one of the lost tribes of Israel, descended from King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba?

Beginning in the Lemba villages in South Africa, where he witnesses customs such as food taboos and circumcision rites that seem part of Jewish tradition, Parfitt retraces the supposed path of the Lembas' through Zimbabwe, Malawi, and Tanzania, taking in sights like Zanzibar and the remains of the stone city Great Zimbabwe.  The story of his eccentric travels, a blend of the ancient allure of King Solomon's mines and Prester John with contemporary Africa in all its beauty and brutality, makes for an irresistible glimpse at a various and rapidly changing continent.

And in a new epilogue, Parfitt discusses recent DNA evidence that, amazingly, lends credence to the Lemba's tribal myth.

France's delusional colonial conquest in the Sahara desert

 

Mint condition. PB. 349pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

The Sahara was the missing link in France's African Empire. The Sword and the Cross is the story of two fanatical adventurers who helped complete their country's imperial conquest. 

Viscomte Charles de Foucauld was a sensualist who lounged in bed eating foie gras with a silver spoon. Henri Laperrine was a stern perfectionist who lived only for soldiering. 

Each of them found his vocation in the desert: Foucauld found religion and an asceticism so great that even Trappism seemed too comfortable; Laperrine formed a legendary camel corps to pursue the Tuareg nomads across the desert. 

By 1910, the Sahara had been won - but as Europe lurched towards war in the years after, both men were to pay a terrible price. 

Weaving together hatred and friendship, self-sacrifice and utter self-delusion, The Sword and the Cross is a brilliant story of a forgotten episode in Europe's colonial history.

An important Chinese history

 

Chinese and world history made on a race track.

Mint condition. HB. 340pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

November 12, 1941: war and revolution are in the air. At the Shanghai Race Club, the city's elite prepare to face off their best horses and most nimble jockeys in the annual Champions Day races.

Across town and amid tight security, others celebrated the birth of Sun Yat-Sen in a new city center meant to challenge European imperialism.

Thousands more Shanghai residents from all walks of life attended the funeral of China's wealthiest woman, the Chinese- French widow of a Baghdadi Jewish businessman.

But the biggest crowd of all gathered at the track; no one knew it, but Champions Day heralded the end of a European Shanghai.

Through this colorful snapshotof the day's events, the rich and complex history that led to them, and a cast of characters as diverse as the city itself, James Carter provides a kaleidoscopic portrait of a time and a place that still speaks to relations between China and the West today.

SOLD An unroarious tour through India

 

SOLD

Mint condition. PB. 262pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

What do you do when your boyfriend dumps you and you’re nursing a broken heart?

For Trisha Bernard, the answer’s clear: escape to India, armed with a copy of the Kama Sutra.

That way you’ll be ready should love (or lust) strike.

But, as Bernard explains in her uproarious account of that madcap adventure, not everything goes quite as planned.

At the last minute, she’s joined by her long-lost friend Sally—an eccentric shopaholic who travels with a jam-packed monster suitcase.

Then, there’s India itself, where the two women end up almost marooned in the Thar Desert, practically camel-napped in Rajasthan, and attacked by an amorous monkey in Delhi. And that’s just the beginning.…

With her ardor for architecture and history, and her Kama Sutra to inspire passion, Trisha Bernard leads us on a wacky, witty, and wonderful romp through one of the world’s most fascinating cultures.

Beating Murdoch in Court

 

A piece of Australian media history.

Mint condition. HB. 358pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Man Bites Murdoch is Bruce Guthrie's explosive account of almost 40 years in the news business, his brutal dismissal from Australia's biggest selling paper, the celebrated court case that exposed the inner workings of the world's biggest media company, and the treachery of its most senior executives.

Guthrie survived tuberculosis, Melbourne's gritty northern suburbs and a boss who twice tried to sack him in his first six months in newspapers, to become a foreign correspondent and then one of Australia's feistiest and most controversial editors. His CV boasts editorships of The Age, The Sunday Age, Herald Sun, Who Weekly, The Weekend Australian Magazine, even a stint at America's celeb-news bible, People. Then, just as he claimed one of the industry's most glittering prizes, he fell foul of Rupert Murdoch and his henchmen, who promptly dispensed with his services. What would any self-respecting Broadmeadows boy do in such circumstances? Sue them, of course.

Man Bites Murdoch exposes the back rooms of Australian business, politics and media and offers a front-row seat at the many seismic events that played out over the last 20 years, including Murdoch's relentless push for growth both here and overseas, young Warwick Fairfax's ill-fated takeover of the family company and the extraordinary impact of the internet.

About the Author

Bruce Guthrie began his media career as a copyboy at The Herald in Melbourne in 1972. After completing a cadetship, he worked in a variety of reporting roles for the paper until 1985, when he was appointed US west coast correspondent for the Herald and Weekly Times, based in Los Angeles.

In 1987 he returned to Australia and became deputy editor of The Herald, leaving two years later to help launch The Sunday Age.

He was appointed editor of that paper in 1992 and editor of The Age in 1995. He joined Time Inc. as a senior editor at People magazine in New York in 1998, and became editor of Who Weekly a year later.

In 2004, he returned to News Limited to become editor of The Weekend Australian Magazine and to launch The Australian's monthly magazine, Wish.

He was appointed editor-in-chief of the Herald Sun, Australia's largest selling daily newspaper, in February 2007 - a role he filled until his dramatic and unexpected exit in November 2008.

Guthrie is married to journalist Janne Apelgren and lives in Melbourne with their two teenage children and a golden retriever named Tilly.

The authorised biography of Nelson Mandela

 

Rare book. Ex-library, Very good condition. 464pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

A biography of Nelson Mandela. Told through unique letters and reminiscences from Mandela and his relatives, the author provides a perspective to the man behind the mask.

About the author

Fatima Meer was a South African writer and academic, a screenwriter, and was a prominent anti-apartheid activist.

Romance and more in the age of swipe

 

Mint condition. PB. 306pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Sex, dates and relationships are just a swipe away. Millions of encounters are happening all over the globe every minute because of the smartphone.

Goodbye computers, adieu boozy watering holes – with smartphone app dating, the ‘bar’ is open 24/7, with no cover charge required.

If your thumbs can do the chat dance, you will flourish in The Age of Swipe. In Swipe - The Game has Changed, author Michael Jarosky documents a year of his swipe encounters.

Raw and 100% real, this explosive account covers everything from his rock star week of sexual adventures to awkward dating disasters and heartbreak.

From chat notification hello to handshake goodbye, become a fly on his wall and learn the game again with new rules and strategies.

From Sydney to New York and London to Tokyo, the game has changed. Seduction techniques in bars and exchange of endless emails via traditional internet dating are now ancient strategies.

Swipe not only delivers Jarosky’s unforgettable journey through the world of swipe dating, but also relays the ‘MISBAC Strategy’ so both men and women are equipped with up-to-date techniques to make new friends, indulge in sexual adventures, experience quality dates, and find lasting relationships in The Age of Swipe.

A journalist unpacks the world's most powerful media mogul

 

Mint condition. HB. 446pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

From the author of the Sunday Times Number One Bestseller Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House

Rupert Murdoch is one of the greatest deal-makers alive. His companies possess extraordinary political and cultural power. Whether it is the Sun and the rise of Thatcher, BSkyB and the transformation of football, or Fox News and the war on terror, we have been living in the age of Murdoch since the late seventies.

But who is he? What drives him?

With unprecedented access to Murdoch and his inner circle, Michael Wolff chronicles the astonishing growth of the mogul's giant media kingdom.

Drawing upon hundreds of hours of interviews he offers us a portrait of a Machiavellian titan; overbearing, but loving, father; love-struck husband; and a cynical and brilliant newsman.

The resulting book is unrivalled in its intimacy and candour and tells a tale of business that is both the story of a man's life, and the story of our times.

Fighting Murdoch in Britain

 

Mint condition. PB. 340pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

For years Rupert Murdoch's newspapers had been hacking, spying, blagging, bribing and destroying the evidence.

They thought they were untouchable. They were wrong.

This is the book that exposed the shadow state at the heart of Britain.

Now fully updated with the very latest in the News Corp scandal, it tells the story of how a criminal conspiracy involving politicians, the police and the press was revealed; the smears and threats they used to cover it up; the brave whistleblowers who cracked open the case - and what it now means for all of us.

A book about our future

 

Mint condition. PB. 264pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

We are in the middle of the greatest technological revolution in history.

Its epicentre lies in Silicon Valley, but its impacts are felt in all corners of the earth.

It could give all of us a better quality of life and new, more cooperative ways of living.

Or it could further entrench inequality, with even more of the world's wealth in the hands of a few.

This book offers a bold vision for ensuring that we achieve the former. A world that is fairer, less violent and most radical of all, more joyous.

Tim Dunlop spells out his ideas for reclaiming common ground systematically, arguing the case for more public ownership of essential assets, more public space, a transparent media system, and an education that prepares us for the future, not the past.

His vision for democracy and society is practical and inspiring, based on ideas about what we are doing well and what we must do better.

His is a vision for handing political power back to we-the-people so that we can stop playing defence and start changing the ground on which decisions about our lives are made.

Welcome to the future of everything....

Hilarious travels through pubs

 

Mint condition. PB. 403pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

According to G.K. Chesterton, the act of getting to and from a pub is central to an understanding of British life and landscape. So bon viveur, pub singer and writer Ian Marchant set off with photographer Perry Venus on a gruelling month long British pub crawl, to go to and from a lot of pubs in order to test Chesterton's hypothesis. 

Publisher's blurb

The British love their booze. Ian Marchant - bon viveur, pub singer and writer - sets off to map the British landscape in drink. This mission takes Ian and his friend Perry on a gruelling month-long pub crawl, from the Turk's Head on the Scilly Isles to the Baa Bar in the Shetlands, taking in as many as possible of the British Isles' 60,000 pubs. Theirs is no sober march from south to north but a reeling, meandering trip as they meet up for a drink with poets and comedians, chavs and hedonists, Europe's foremost pub philosopher and Ian's Uncle Tony. This booze-addled, pork-scratching-fuelled trip makes a hilarious and uniquely British travelogue.

Reviews

“'The greatest pub crawl ever recorded ... Full of wonderful anecdotes, extraordinary characters and more absurd facts than any pub quiz would throw up'” –  Daily Mirror

“'He's an authority on everything. I'll have whatever he's having ... Marchant is just the kind of bloke you'd like to meet down the pub'” –  Daily Telegraph

Inside the hilarious Little Britain

 

Mint condition. PB. 448pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

By turns intimate, eye-opening and hilarious, Inside Little Britain is the ultimate autobiographical documentary of two of our most-cherished British national icons

Written together with friend and journalist Boyd Hilton, Inside Little Britain follows a year in the lives of Matt Lucas and David Walliams - the good, the bad, the mundane and the monumental. A year that includes at its core a mammoth nine-month Spinal Tap-esque tour where Little Britain goes in search of Great Britain. This is a milestone book that offers an unrivalled close-up of a classic British comedy act, as it happens, at the height of its powers.

But it is also a journey back into their pasts, reflecting on just how they got from there to here. It covers their childhoods, family life and early comedy performances as they found their feet; their complex friendship and working relationship; and the increasingly insane world they now inhabit.

Mixing memoir and travelogue to paint an engrossing portrait of fame and comic genius, Inside Little Britain is an unmissable, candid window on life inside the celebrity bubble in all its glamour and awfulness.

Unrelated humour

A refugee memoir

 

Mint condition. PB. 386pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Duy Long Nguyen ( Longy ) left Vietnam, with his mother’s blessing, on a boat bound anywhere safe. He carried with him too many memories of war. He had seen things no child should ever see.

Fate saw him arrive in Australia. Determined to find his way in his new country, he battled racism and struggled for acceptance.

Jokes to embarrass your mother-in-law

 

Mint condition. HB. 341pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

A book containing every joke guaranteed to annoy those who like to think of themselves as politically correct. It deliberately sets out to offend "prudes and those who take life too seriously".

Profiling 10 Australian Prime Ministers

Mint condition. PB. 264pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

A captivating inside account of the strengths, weaknesses and personalities of Australia's last ten prime ministers, from Menzies to Howard. Untold stories of the travels, conversations and experiences of ten people who have shaped our country over the last 40 years.