A Scotsman rides a motor bike across America.

 

Mint condition. PB. 303pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Follow much-loved Scottish comedian Billy Connolly across Route 66 on this unforgettable journey, filled with music, modern history and hilarious stories.

Billy Connolly first dreamed of taking a trip on the legendary Route 66 when he heard Chuck Berry belting out one of the greatest rock 'n' roll records of all time - and now he's finally had the chance to do it. Travelling every one of its 2,278 miles on his custom-make motorbike, Billy's journey takes him past many of the best-known icons in the US: the Gateway Arch in St Louis, Monument Valley and the Grand Canyon, and the funky neon-lit gas stations and diners that once lined the route.

Billy also has the chance to get to know the people who call it home, from Mervin the Amish carpenter, to fellow banjo enthusiast and obsessive instrument collector Rob, to Angel, one of the many people determined to keep the spirit of the Mother Road alive. Funny, touching and inspiring in equal measure, the tales he gathers on the way tell the story of modern America.

With his unrivalled instinct for a good story, and the gregariousness that has made him a comedy legend, Billy Connolly is the ultimate guide to the ultimate road trip.

On 5 decades of comedy

 

Mint condition. HB. 352pp. $30 including postage anywhere in Australia

The world of comedy and comedians of the last five decades, by the man the New York Times calls "a comic institution himself," the only comedian (twenty-six years in stand-up) to have made Elie Wiesel laugh, as well as having appeared on The Tonight Show (140 times, second only to Bob Hope, but who's counting), director of TV comedy series Mad About You, Seinfeld, Friends, Weeds and Curb Your Enthusiasm.

The world of comedy and comedians of the last five decades. By the man the New York Times calls "a comic institution himself," the only comedian (twenty-six years in stand-up) to have made Elie Wiesel laugh, as well as having appeared on The Tonight Show (140 times, second only to Bob Hope, but who's counting). From the director of TV comedy series Mad About You, Seinfeld, Friends, Weeds and Curb Your Enthusiasm.

Larry David- "I'm lucky. I know and love David Steinberg. You don't. Now's your chance. Don't blow it!"

"David has always been a comedy hero to me. One of his many gifts is the ability to inspire funny people to be even funnier, as you will discover in this truly hilarious, insightful book." --Martin Short


From David Steinberg, a rabbi's son from Winnipeg, Canada, who at age fifteen enrolled at Hebrew Theological College in Chicago (the rabbinate wasn't for him) and four years later, entered the master's program in English literature at the University of Chicago, until he saw Lenny Bruce, the "Blue Boy" of Comedy, the coolest guy Steinberg had ever seen, and joined Chicago's Second City improvisational group, becoming, instead, the comedian's comedian, director, actor, working with, inspired by, teaching, and learning from the most celebrated, admired, complicated comedians, then and now--a funny, moving, provocative, insightful look into the soul, wit, and bite of comedy and comedians--a universe unto itself--of the last half-century.

From the greats- George Burns, Lenny Bruce, Sid Caesar, Lucille Ball, Mel Brooks, and Carl Reiner, et al., to the newer greats- Carol Burnett, Steve Martin, Lily Tomlin, Billy Crystal, Bob Newhart, and the man for all comedy, Martin (Marty) Short; to the greats of right now- Chris Rock, Dave Chappelle, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Wanda Sykes; and more . . .

Steinberg, through stories, reminiscences, tales of directing, touring, performing, and, through the comedians themselves talking (from more than 75 interviews), makes clear why he loves comedy and comedians who have been by his side in his work, and in his life, for more than sixty years.

Here are- Will Ferrell, Eric Idle, Whoopi Goldberg, Mike Myers, Groucho himself and the greatest of them all (at least of the last half century), Jonathan Winters .

The Betoota Advocate 2020 yearbook

 

Mint condition. PB. 256 pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Bloody hilarious. 

From the heart of the Western Queensland Channel Country, Australia's oldest and favourite newspaper details our country's very rocky start to a new decade that was supposed to be one of great optimism and innovation.

2020 was meant to be our year of healing. A time to tend to the wounds of a country torn asunder by a decade of divisive political and media debates. A lack of confidence in the international sporting arena. A 24-hour news cycle that has destroyed the pub test.

We thought all of the uncertainty was behind us. The federal election delivered us Scotty from Marketing. The Quiet Australian spoke up. Gay marriage? Yep. Climate change? Let's wait and see what happens. Smudge and Warner had served their time and, together as a nation, it was time to rebuild.

But fate had other plans, starting with the worst bushfires in human memory. While large swathes of the country burned, our politicians were either on holidays or giving their mates grants to build indoor pools in blue-ribbon seats. Surely, it couldn't get worse.

'ken oath it could. Mother nature arrived as COVID-19, and told us all to go to our rooms.

About the Author

The Betoota Advocate is a small and independent regional newspaper from far west Queensland. We pride ourselves on reporting fair and just news with an authenticity that rivals only the salt on the sunburnt earth that surrounds us here in the Queensland Channel Country. Established in the mid-1800s, we are arguably Australia's oldest newspaper and have always taken pride in our ability to report both regional and metropolitan news. Recently, our popularity has grown immensely as result of a bold online revival

PJ O'Rourke on why you shouldn't vote

 

Mint condition. PB. 304pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia

Put the country's big, fat political ass on a diet. Lose that drooping deficit. Slim those spreading entitlement programs. Firm up that flabby pair of butt cheeks which are the Senate and the House.

Having had a lot of fun with what politicians do, P.J. O'Rourke now has a lot of fun with what we should think about those politicians. Nothing good, to be sure. 

Best-selling humorist P.J. O'Rourke is back with his latest political masterpiece, Don't Vote--It Just Encourages The Bastards. Using his signature wit and keen observational skills, O'Rourke reflects on his forty year career as a political commentator, spanning his addlepated hippie youth to his current state of right-wing grouch maturity. Don't Vote--It Just Encourages The Bastards is a brilliant, disturbing, hilarious and sobering look at why politics and politicians are a necessary evil--but only just barely necessary. Read P.J. O'Rourke on the pathetic nature of politics and laugh through your tears or--what the hell--just laugh.

An Idle tour of America

 

Excellent condition. PB. 356pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Eric Idle, the legendary star of Monty Python fame, takes fans on a deeply personal and hilarious whirlwind tour around America.

'I still feel somewhat nervous encroaching on the Palin territory of writing a travel diary based on a journey ... though it is true, I reason, that all the Pythons have been involved in documentaries. So this must be a Python thing. What is this urge to probe and examine by ex-comedians? Are they tired of dressing up as women? Surely not.' - Eric Idle

The man who brought you the anthems 'Always Look on the Bright Side of Life' and 'Sit on my Face' shows his naughty bits - and much more! As he crossed the US on The Greedy Bastard Tour, Eric Idle kept a diary on the Monty Python website updating fans with his experiences, insights and observations. Inspired by those blogs, THE GREEDY BASTARD DIARY is an honest, hysterical and moving book - part travelogue, part memoir - that chronicles those 80 days on the road, offering Idle's thoughts on his career, personal life and the country he now calls his home. Reflective, ironic, and stamped with his renowned wit, this illuminating work takes readers on a personal tour with the legendary star and offers an intimate, close-up look inside the man as never before.

Injecting humour into home duties

 

Very good condition. PB. 224pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

In Home Truths, comedian and author Mandy Nolan explores the significance of place in relationship to self, specifically what it is about home that is so intrinsic to our sense of self and what is says about our place in the world and our emotional, mental and spiritual wellbeing. This is a book about who we are in the place where we live, and why; It's about who we are when no-one is watching, when the doors are closed and the pants come off.

Jewish humour at its finest

 

PB. Very good condition. 310 pages. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Two rival businessmen meet in the Warsaw train station. "Where are you going" says the first man.

"To Minsk," says the second.

"To Minsk, eh What a nerve you have! I know you're telling me you're going to Minsk because you want me to think that you're really going to Pinsk. But it so happens that I know you really are going to Minsk. So why are you lying to me"

Four men are walking in the desert.

The German says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have a beer."

The Italian says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have wine."

The Mexican says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have tequila."

The Jew says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have diabetes."

The ultimate collection of jokes

 

PB. 555pp. Good condition. $15 including postage anywhere in Australia.

A Man Walks Into A Bar is a one-stop shop for anyone who likes to hear and tell jokes. The jokes are ordered thematically - wives, husbands, doctors, lawyers, the French, the Germans, jokes about nuns, jokes about monkeys, the lot. There are also regular panels which group jokes by type too - Essex girls, changing a lightbulb etc. Our material will turn you into the toast of your local pub or make you loathed in your own home - remember, it is all in the telling. From the sublimely erudite to stuff Frank Carson would turn down (the book has a 'world's worst jokes' section), this book can service you with every joke you'll ever need.

What do you call an eskimo chav?
Innuinnit

What did the zen student say at the hamburger stand?
Make me one with everything

What's Irish and lives in the garden?
Paddy O'Furniture

A fictitious biography of Donald Trump

 

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

A provocatively entertaining, savagely funny satire on Donald Trump by Britain’s greatest comic novelist, winner of the Man Booker Prize

A provocatively entertaining, savagely funny satire on Donald Trump by Britain’s greatest comic novelist.

Pussy is the story of Prince Fracassus, heir presumptive to the Duchy of Origen, famed for its golden-gated skyscrapers and casinos, who passes his boyhood watching reality shows on TV, imagining himself to be the Roman Emperor Nero, and fantasizing about hookers. He is idle, boastful, thin-skinned and egotistic; has no manners, no curiosity, no knowledge, no idea and no words in which to express them. Could he, in that case, be the very leader to make the country great again?

Howard Jacobson has written sixteen novels and five works of non-fiction. He won the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Award in 2000 for The Mighty Walzer and then again in 2013 for Zoo Time. In 2010 he won the Man Booker Prize for The Finkler Question; he was also shortlisted for the prize in 2014 for J.

Dawn French's hilarious story telling

 

Mint condition. PB. 352pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Who is in Coma Suite Number 5?

A matchless lover? A supreme egotist? A selfless martyr? A bad mother? A cherished sister? A selfish wife?

All of these. For this is Silvia Shute who has always done exactly what she wants. Until now, when her life suddenly, shockingly stops.

Her past holds a dark and terrible secret, and now that she is unconscious in a hospital bed, her constant stream of visitors are set to uncover the mystery of her broken life. And she must lie there, victim of the beloveds, the borings, the babblings and the plain bonkers.

Like it or not, the truth is about to pay Silvia a visit. Again, and again and again...

A selection of Clive James' best TV reviews

 

Very good condition. PB. 240pp. $15 including postage anywhere in Australia.

'His contribution to the art and enjoyment of TV criticism over the past ten years has been immense. His work is deeply perceptive, often outrageously funny and always compulsively readable'

Said the judges of the British Press Awards, in naming Clive James Critic of the Year for 1981. The Crystal Bucket offers a further selection of his inimitable TV criticism for the Observer.

'C.J. didn't get where he is today just by being funny. He is humane, liberal and compassionate . . . What he writes is always pertinent and always witty . . We own him a deep debt of gratitude' Gavin Ewart, Listener

'Few critics have a more unerring ear for woolliness and doubletalk or a more scathing and entertaining way of dealing with it' Lesley Garner, Good Housekeeping

'He is one of the most remarkable figures in British cultural life at the moment: a poet and gifted literary critic who is also genuinely liked by the mass audience' Michael Mason, London Review of Books

'One of the few columnists who make you laugh aloud . . . if there were angels he would be on their side: and that would certainly include Charlie's Angels' Melvyn Bragg, Sunday Times

SOLD Travels into the heart of dangerous Borneo

 

SOLD

Very good condition. PB. 208pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

The story of a 1983 journey to the center of Borneo, which no expedition had attempted since 1926. O'Hanlon, accompanied by friend and poet James Fenton and three native guides brings wit and humor to a dangerous journey.

SOLD A Dutchman travels across the Sahara in a Mercedes

 

SOLD

Rare book. Mint condition. PB. 210pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

“Oh Lord, won’t you buy me a Mercedes Benz?”
—Janis Joplin

A journalist’s intrepid endeavor to sell his used car abroad results in a high-spirited and revealing look at West Africa.

“Look, there’s my car,” I say, pointing at my Mercedes in the parking lot.

“Where?” a fellow desert traveler asks.

“There, that Mercedes,” I say.

He looks at me, questioning. “You want to drive that through the Sahara?”
 
Jeroen van Bergeijk came up with what seemed like a great scheme for making a quick profit: buy a clunker of a car in his native Amsterdam and resell it in the Third World, where a market even for jalopies still thrives. His chariot of choice is a rusted-out 1988 Mercedes 190D with 220,000 kilometers on its odometer; his route will take him from Holland through Morocco, across the Sahara, and into some of the least trodden parts of Africa.

My Mercedes Is Not for Sale is a rollicking tale of an innocent abroad. The author finds himself facing a driving challenge akin to the Dakar Rally but encounters obstacles never dreamed of by race-car drivers: active minefields, occasional banditry—mostly by the border guards—and a teenage, chain-smoking desert guide with a fondness for Tupac lyrics. 

Food and water are scarce, sandstorms are frequent, and all he has to patch up his many car breakdowns thousands of miles from civilization is a bar of soap, some duct tape, and a pair of women’s nylons. Then there’s the coup he survived.

My Mercedes Is Not for Sale captures more than the adventure—it vividly portrays the impact of globalization on Africa through a surprise-filled journey into its thriving car culture, while asking the question: is the white man’s burden really a used car?

A humorous Jewish memoir of life in the Soviet Sixties

 

Rare book. Mint condition. HB. 307pp. $30 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Read more about this book here.

Judith Lucy discovers her soul

 

Mint condition. Signed by the author. PB. 256pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

• A book about life that discusses liquor and lovemaking as much as it does the point of it all. 
• 
  
• Judith Lucy has looked everywhere for happiness. Growing up a Catholic, she thought about becoming a nun, and later threw herself into work, finding a partner and getting off her face. Somehow, none of that worked. 
• 
  
• So lately, she's been asking herself the big questions. Why are we here? Is there a God? What happens when we die? And why can't she tell you which of her friends has herpes, but not what they believe in? 
• 
  
• In her first volume of memoir, the bestselling The Lucy Family Alphabet, Judith to work out her parents. 
• 
  
• In Drink, Smoke, Pass Out, she tries to find out if there's more to life than wanting to suck tequila out of Ryan Gosling's navel. With disarming frankness and classic dry wit, she reviews the major paths of her life and, alarmingly, finds herself on a journey. 
• 
  
• 'A well written, poignant, moving and naturally humorous story of one forty-something's attempt to get her life together.' Australian Bookseller + Publisher 
• 
  
• 'An often hilarious, at times disarming account of her ongoing search for spiritual awakening.' Madison 
• 
  
• 'Can she write? Heck, yeah . . . At least one laugh per page - that's about 245 laughs' Herald Sun

Hilarious autiographical stories from one of Australia's best female comics

 

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

Should we bring back the Visible Panty Line (because wearing a g - string is sexual harassment)? Are you allergic to your friends? What is the difference between having a child and passing a camel through the eye of a needle? Why will no man ever appreciate anything a woman achieves academically unless she does it in the nude? 

Some people have an extraordinary way of viewing the ordinary. This book is a collection of wit, poignancy and silliness from one such person.

Classic Australian comedic fiction

 

Very good condition. PB. 299pp. $18 including postage anywhere in Australia.

"I basically blew my university days in the pursuit of one girl."

Richard Derrington has been trashed, the sort of tragic thrashing when the take-out place's caller ID identifies you as your ex, the kind of thorough trashing that causes you to invent spontaneous trips to Melbourne and makes heartbreaking moments of junk mail. That may be why he's distracted and work and crap on the racquetball court. That may be why Greg the cat has found himself ground zero for a flea infestation and why Richard's renovation of his grandparents' home has begun and ended at the verandah railing.

But that's not altogether true. In between a complicated relationship with his boss and earning himself a Neighbor of the Month award on Zigzag Street, Richard will correct anyone who calls him Ricky, get caught up by The Spanish Tragedy, and stumble his way from perpetrator of a mild concussion to befuddled participant in a dinner party that may or may not be a first date.

Zigzag Street. It's where Richard Derrington will dance naked in the office. It's where he might just come of age in his late twenties.

And it's where it all began for critically acclaimed Brisbane author Nick Earls. Winner of the Betty Trask award, Who Weekly called Zigzag Street "A comic masterpiece." Readers called it "seriously funny" and "Great Australian writing."

A book about Bogans

 

Mint condition. PB. 304pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Based on the popular website, Things Bogans Like is a revolutionary manifesto that lifts the lid on the secret sect of 'the bogan'. You don't have to come from QLD, WA or South Australia to understand this book.

The word bogan has a bad rap; first impressions are still associated with flannelette, VB, utes and mullets. But this would be wrong. The bogan has advanced and needs new explanation, evolution has cursed (or blessed, depending on your thinking) us with a modern version. The bogan with money. The bogan with aspirations. The bogan with Ed Hardy T-shirts. The new bogan will not rest until it owns a plasma TV so large that Rove McManus becomes six feet tall for the first time.

Today s bogan defies income, class, race, creed, gender, religion and logic. Now the bogan is defined by what it does, what it says and, most importantly, what it buys. Those who choose to deny the bogan on the basis of their North Shore home, their stockbroking career or their massive trust fund choose not to see the real bogan. Many bogans are affluent and perhaps are working in that same stockbroking firm and sharing a Corona with you over Friday night drinks. They set themselves apart by their efforts to stand out by conforming as furiously, and conspicuously, as possible.

The authors, six self-confessed snobs, have drawn on their friends, family, neighbours, workmates and that guy who always jumps the queue at the bar, to show the evolution of the much-loved Australian bogan, their modern desires, and how we can either join them or mock them.

This will be a groundbreaking sociological publication and, far more importantly, the perfect Christmas gift for anyone who has ever bought a Buddhist-themed water feature, Ed Hardy T-shirt or watched Today Tonight.

The scandals of a Tory businessman

 

Excellent condition. PB. 436pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

This title tells the tale of how the wannabe aristo Conrad Black and his ambitious wife Barbara made their way into the City, the Tory party, Wall Street and High Society. This is an entertaining account of gullibility in high places.

Hilarious and wise short stories from the Middle East

 

Mint condition. PB. 208pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Classic warped and wonderful stories from a genius (The New York Times) and master storyteller.

Brief, intense, painfully funny, and shockingly honest, Etgar Keret's stories are snapshots that illuminate with intelligence and wit the hidden truths of life. As with the best writers of fiction, hilarity and anguish are the twin pillars of his work. Keret covers a remarkable emotional and narrative terrain - from a father's first lesson to his boy to a standoff between soldiers caught up in the Middle East conflict to a slice of life where nothing much happens.