A Scotsman writes humorously about his dog

 

Mint condition. HB. 204 pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

It seems now like a different me, the years I spent with Martin, a Doberman dog, and before he came, another me; and it is a new me now, once again, writing this. I would have been dead long ago had I continued to live the way I had before he came.

I think someone would have murdered me, given how I drank and the dives that I drank in and that I was an aggressive, angry man. I had no money and no friends. I didn’t care, I couldn’t have. 

Thomas Healy was a drunk, a fighter, sometimes a writer, often unemployed, no stranger to the police. His life was going nowhere but downhill. Then one day he bought a pup—a Doberman. He called him Martin. 

Gradually man and dog became unshakable allies, the closest of comrades, the best of friends. They took long walks together, they vacationed together, they even went to church together. Martin, in more ways than one, saved Thomas Healy’s life. 

Written with unadulterated candor and profound love, this soulful memoir gets at the heart of the intense bond between people and dogs.

A guide for bringing up Muslim teems

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

From the preface: “Teen years we are told by society are the time for school dances, house parties, and road trips, the time for underage drinking, for dating, for casinos and gambling, the time for exploring and discovering, discovering beer, discovering drugs, discovering the opposite sex, the time for finding yourself; teen years, we are told, are the time of your life.

Teen years are the paradoxical highlight of life in the western world. They are the time in which one is bombarded with knowledge and freed from responsibility. Teens have the privileges of an adult and the responsibilities of a child; teens rebel by conforming; the stand out by melting into their group of friends.

Being a teen means wanting independence but not having the wisdom it requires; it means having energy and conviction and needing a cause to which to devote them.

For those of you who, by the will of Allah, wish to instill knowledge and wisdom into their independent teens, to give their teens the Islamic cause into which they can pour their energy and conviction, those who wish to raise teens who can raise the Ummah, this book is for you."

The story of an Australian who fought at Tobruk

 

Ex-library. Mint condition. Rare book. Amazon retails at over $200. 319pp. $35 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Journey to Tobruk tells the remarkable life story of John Murray, a genuine Australian hero, on and off the battlefield. This engaging blend of military history and biography - with a strand of family history (and family secrets) woven through - follows the transformation of a raw young bushman into a courageous soldier and inspiring leader. 

A lifelong correspondence between John and his mother is a feature of the narrative; Murray's laconic tone, which never falters even as he endures the horrors of the North African campaign as a 'rat of Tobruk', is definitively Australian. 

An illegitimate child whose wealthy grazier father never acknowledged him, John was sent at age fourteen to work on an outback sheep property as a jackeroo. The harshness of this environment schooled him for survival, forging the strength and resourcefulness that were later tested in the crucible of war. While the story also follows Murray's post-war life, the focus of this moving and impeccably researched book remains John's six-year wartime odyssey, from Australia, to Tobruk, El Alamein, New Guinea and Borneo, evoked in heart-gripping detail, supported by maps and images. 

Through it all, this fascinating, brave, resilient and humane man retains an optimism and stoicism that allow him to face and conquer the horror he confronts.

SOLD Primer on Islamic faith and culture

 

SOLD to a lawyer in Tasmania.

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

Islam is the way of life for million of people around the world. Its teachings guide people to live harmoniously and in balance with themselves, others and the world around them. Everyday people come into contact with Islam and those who practice this faith. The need to know about the Islamic teachings has become more important then ever.

As Muslims assimilated the English language into their rainbow of languages, the need for clear and concise literature grows. This is especially true when one considers that there are millions of Muslims whose native language is now English. In addition many seekers of truth have been yearning for a book that would present the clear and precise Islamic view of life in a format that not only invites further study and research, but that also provides the path to achieve this goal.

"What Islam is All About" is a textbook designed to meet all of these needs. In one volume is included the basic history of the Prophet Muhammad, (peace be upon him), the teaching of Islam, the history of the ancient Prophets, the study of the Quran, the Islamic philosophy of the world and life within it, Islamic law, Hadith, contemporary issues and much more.

Perfect for Muslim schools, Sunday schools, adult study classes, independent learners, students of religion, seekers of truth and anyone interested to know more about Islam from an insider's point of view. You will not find a more complete, compelling, and pleasant presentation of Islam and what it teaches anywhere else!

Plain language for lawyers

 

Mint condition. PB. 352pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia

Professor Kimble names Michele Asprey's book Plain Language for Lawyers as one of the top publications in the history of plain language. In Writing for Dollars, Writing to Please - The Case for Plain Language in Business, Government, and Law - Carolina Academic Press, Durham, North Carolina, Professor Kimble lists Michele Asprey's book as number 7 on his list of the top publications - quite an accolade. It appears alongside David Mellinkoff's book The Language of the Law (from 1963), Richard Wydick's book Plain English for Lawyers (from 1979), Rudloph Flesch's work, and Ernest Gowers's The Complete Plain Words, among others.

The idea that lawyers can - and should - write in plain language is not new. There have always been plain language lawyers. There just aren't enough of them. The plain language movement in Australia has been with us for decades. Plain language has been taught in law schools in Australia for almost 20 years. But still too many lawyers don't write in language that clients, and other readers, can understand. Plain Language for Lawyers can help. Over the 18 years it has been in print and it has established itself in Australia and overseas as a comprehensive, entertaining and enormously useful text. It includes international references, contains practical advice, and can be read and enjoyed by anyone who is interested in plain language in the law. The 4th edition has been completely revised and updated.

Divorce & kids

 

Mint condition. PB. 254pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia

Expert advice for discussing divorce with your children

Written by Dr. Samantha Rodman, founder of DrPsychMom.com, How to Talk to Your Kids about Your Divorce teaches you how to raise a happy, thriving family in a changing environment. Each page offers expert advice for discussing your decision in healthy and effective ways, including breaking the initial news, fostering an open dialogue, and ensuring that your children's emotional needs are met throughout your separation. With Dr. Rodman's proven communication techniques, you will:

• Initiate honest conversations where your children can express their thoughts
• Discuss divorce-related topics and answer questions in age-appropriate ways
• Validate your children's feelings, making them feel acknowledged and secure
• Strengthen and deepen your relationship with your kids

Whether you're raising toddlers, school-aged children, or young adults, How to Talk to Your Kids About Your Divorce will help your kids feel heard, valued, and loved during this difficult time.

Defending the world's only Jewish state

 

Rare book. Good condition. $30 including postage anywhere in Australia

A history of science and a key scientific institution

 

Mint condition. PB. 464pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia

Edited and introduced by Bill Bryson, and with contributions from Richard Dawkins, Margaret Atwood, David Attenborough, Martin Rees and Richard Fortey amongst others, this is a remarkable volume celebrating the 350th anniversary of the Royal Society.

On a damp weeknight in November, 350 years ago, a dozen or so men gathered at Gresham College in London. A twenty-eight year old — and not widely famous — Christopher Wren was giving a lecture on astronomy. As his audience listened to him speak, they decided that it would be a good idea to create a Society to promote the accumulation of useful knowledge.

With that, the Royal Society was born. Since its birth, the Royal Society has pioneered scientific exploration and discovery. Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, Albert Einstein, Robert Hooke, Robert Boyle, Joseph Banks, Humphry Davy, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, John Locke, Alexander Fleming — all were fellows.

Bill Bryson’s favourite fellow was Reverend Thomas Bayes, a brilliant mathematician who devised Bayes’ theorem. Its complexity meant that it had little practical use in Bayes’ own lifetime, but today his theorem is used for weather forecasting, astrophysics and stock market analysis. A milestone in mathematical history, it only exists because the Royal Society decided to preserve it — just in case.

The Royal Society continues to do today what it set out to do all those years ago. Its members have split the atom, discovered the double helix, the electron, the computer and the World Wide Web. Truly international in its outlook, it has created modern science.

Seeing Further celebrates its momentous history and achievements, bringing together the very best of science writing. Filled with illustrations of treasures from the Society’s archives, this is a unique, ground-breaking and beautiful volume, and a suitable reflection of the immense achievements of science.

On the art of public speaking and presentation

 

RARE BOOK. Very good condition. PB. 161pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia

For novices with little public speaking experience, this guide shows how to speak in public effectively and with confidence in situations including presentations at work, teaching or lecturing, and addressing community organizations. 

Public speaking pro Tom Mira covers all the basics, from the opening line, to using visual aids, to dealing with a hostile audience.

An ex-priest writes about his civilisation

 

RARE BOOK. Excellent condition. PB. 374pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Not yet another history of the Church written from within the church, this is a deliberately provocative, no holds barred, open forum discussion of the issues of Christianity.

Find out more about this book here. 

SOLD The definitive history of Australian Jews

 

SOLD to a lawyer in East Sydney

Mint condition. Rare book. HB. 616pp. $35 including postage anywhere in Australia

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 .

SOLD What the West gained from the rest

 

SOLD to an uber driver in Arncliffe

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

Travels in Antarctica

 

Mint condition. PB. 320pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia

Looks at past, present and future of Australian involvement in Antarctica. Craig Cormick is a Canberra based award winning author.

Departing Hobart on a seven-week voyage on board the RSV Aurora Australis, Craig Cormick is fulfilling a long-time dream to visit the frozen continent of Antarctica - an adventure to one of the few under-discovered regions of the world. As the ship navigates its way through the wild Southern Ocean and explores the icy coastline of the Antarctic continent, Craig muses about - and with - the great explorer and geologist Douglas Mawson. Mawson's ill-fated but scientifically successful Australasian Antarctic Expedition sailed from Hobart in 1911, as Scott and Amundsen were embarking on their race to the South Pole. 

Visiting the three Australian bases, with Mawson's ghost at his side, Craig Cormick describes the exhilaration of seeing his first iceberg, climbing a mountain on the Antarctic plateau, flying in a helicopter over the Vestfold Hills, photographing Adelie penguins, seeing the spectacular Aurora Australis in the sky, smelling elephant seals and discovering the mysteries of 'crap and wrap' field toilets. In Bed with Douglas Mawson is a humorous and thoughtful exploration of the enduring spirit of discovery, adventure and comradeship around Antarctica.

The best travel writing on Nepal

 

Mint condition. HB. 512pp. $30 including postage anywhere in Australia

In April 2015, catastrophic earthquakes left Nepal devastated. Over 7,000 people lost their lives and more than twice as many were injured. Hundreds of thousands were made homeless and UNESCO World Heritage sites were destroyed.

HOUSE OF SNOW is the biggest, most comprehensive and most beautiful collection of writing about Nepal in print. It includes over 50 excerpts of fiction and non-fiction inspired by the breathtaking landscapes and rich cultural heritage of this fascinating country.

Here are explorers and mountaineers, poets and political journalists, national treasures and international stars such as Michael Palin and Jon Krakauer, Laxmi Prasad Devkota and ManjushreeThapa – all hand-picked by well-known authors and scholars of Nepali literature including Samrat Upadhyay, Michael Hutt, Isabella Tree and Thomas Bell.

An authoritative account of the Dismissal of the Whitlam government

 

Mint condition. HB. 448pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Drawing on a range of new sources, some of which have never before been made public - including hundreds of pages from Kerr's archives - this remarkable account is dispassionate in its analysis, vivid in its narrative and brutal in its conclusions. It exposes the true motivations, the extent of the deceit and the scale of the collusion.

Forty years on, the dismissal remains one of the most damaging and controversial events in Australian politics.

This groundbreaking book by two of our leading journalists provides a startling reinterpretation of events. It tells the story of the clash between extraordinary personalities- two political giants - Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser - and an ambitious and calculating governor-general, Sir John Kerr.

Drawing on a range of new sources, some of which have never before been made public - including hundreds of pages from Kerr's archives - this remarkable account is dispassionate in its analysis, vivid in its narrative and brutal in its conclusions. It exposes the true motivations, the extent of the deceit and the scale of the collusion.

The definitive biography of David Bowie

 

Mint condition. HB. 496pp. $20 including postage anywhere in Australia.

The 10th January, 2016 will no doubt resonate with David Bowie fans across the globe from now on. The world was shocked to wake to the sudden news of his death from cancer, which he had been secretly battling for eighteen months. The outpouring of grief, empathy and loss has been palpable, honest and raw. And he had only turned sixty-nine.

Respected arts commentator Paul Morley, one of the team who curated the highly successful retrospective exhibition for the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, David Bowie Is . . . constructs the definitive story of Bowie that explores how he worked, played, aged, structured his ideas, invented the future and entered history as someone who could and would never be forgotten. Morley will capture the greatest moments of Bowie’s career; from the recording studio with the likes of Brian Eno and Tony Visconti; to iconic live performances from the 1970s, 80s and 90s, as well as the various encounters and artistic relationships he developed with rock luminaries John Lennon, Lou Reed and Iggy Pop. And of course, discuss in detail his much-heralded, and critically-acclaimed comeback with the release of Black Star just days before his shocking death in New York.

Morley will offer a startling biographical critique of David Bowie’s legacy, showing how he never stayed still even when he withdrew from the spotlight, how he always knew his own worth, and released a dazzling plethora of mobile Bowies into the world with a bloody-minded determination and a voluptuous imagination to create something amazing that was not there before.

About the Author

Writer, broadcaster, and cultural critic Paul Morley has written about music, art, and entertainment since the 1970s. A founding member of the electronic collective Art of Noise and a member of staff at the Royal Academy of Music, he is the author of Ask: Chatter of Pop; Words and Music: A History of Pop in the Shape of a City; Piece by Piece: Writing About Joy Division 1977–2007; Earthbound; The North; and Nothing, and he collaborated with music icon Grace Jones on her memoir, I’ll Never Write My Memoirs.

The Churchill family

 

Excellent condition. PB. 640pp. $25 including postage anywhere in Australia

There never was a Churchill from John of Marlborough down who had either morals or principles', so said Gladstone. From the First Duke of Marlborough - soldier of genius, restless empire-builder and cuckolder of Charles II - onwards, the Churchills have been politicians, gamblers and profligates, heroes and womanisers.

The Churchills is a richly layered portrait of an extraordinary set of men and women - grandly ambitious, regularly impecunious, impulsive, arrogant and brave. And towering above the Churchill clan is the figure of Winston - his failures and his triumphs shown in a new and revealing context - ultimately our 'greatest Briton'.

A comprehensive history of London

 

Mint condition. PB. 1,111 pp, $35 including postage anywhere in Australia

Amazon is selling this for $60.

The Romans built it, the Angles and Saxons invaded it, the Vikings ravaged it, the Normans conquered it. From its beginnings as a foreign outpost on the banks of the Thames in the first century to, in the twenty-first, the teeming metropolitan sprawl of an extraordinarily cosmopolitan world capital, London has been shaped by successive waves of migration into a marvelous polyglot of a city. The history of London may indeed be a history of printing, the theater, newspapers, museums, pleasure gardens, music halls, international finance, and the novel, but for Stephen Inwood it is a history of the people whose tastes, talents, philosophies, and pocketbooks have created it -- and sometimes threatened to destroy it.

Toward a genuinely environmentally conscious capitalism

 

Mint Condition. HB. 576pp. $50 including postage anywhere in Australia.

Amazon is selling this for $86.

This book is about innovation, solutions, competitiveness and profitability. It is also about building environmental integrity and sustainability now and for future generations. The Natural Advantage of Nations pulls together for the first time a vast literature to demonstrate the need for a new paradigm of sustainable development. The book brings together the work of more than 30 leading thinkers, and fresh evidence from around the globe, to show that the drive for an ecologically sustainable world need not be in conflict with economics and business practices. This book draws a bold vision for the future and tells us how to get there by building on the lessons of competitive advantage theory and the latest in sustainability, economics, innovation, business and governance theory and practise. This is top-drawer reading for business people, economists, engineers, consultants, policy-makers, researchers, students and indeed anyone working to create a better world.

The authors incorporate innovative technical, structural and social advances, and explore the role that governance can play in both leading and underpinning business and communities in the shift towards a sustainable future. Coupled with a companion website, this book builds on from the latest in the business case for sustainability and goes beyond it. This book shows how in a tripartite world where business government and civil society all have power, how each can best play their part and better work together to achieve win win outcomes. The result is nothing less than the most authoritative and comprehensive guide to building the new ecologically sustainable economy.