Phosphorescence: On Awe, Wonder and Things That Sustain You When the World Goes Dark by Julia Baird

$29.99 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

A beautiful, intimate and inspiring investigation into how we can find and nurture within ourselves that essential quality of internal happiness - the 'light within' that Julia Baird calls 'phosphorescence' - which will sustain us even through the darkest times. Over the last decade, we have become bett er at knowing what brings us contentment, well-being and joy. We know, for example, that there are a few core truths to science of happiness. We know that being kind and altruistic makes us happy, that turning off devices, talking to people, forging relationships, living with meaning and delving into the concerns of others offer our best chance at achieving happiness. But how do we retain happiness? It often slips out of our hands as quickly as we find it. So, when we are exposed to, or learn, good things, how do we continue to burn with them?And more than that, when our world goes dark, when we're overwhelmed by illness or heartbreak, loss or pain, how do we survive, stay alive or even bloom? In the muck and grit of a daily existence full of disappointments and a disturbing lack of control over many of the things that matter most - finite relationships, fragile health, fraying economies, a planet in peril - how do we find, nurture and carry our own inner, living light - a light to ward off the darkness? Absorbing, achingly beautiful, inspiring and deeply moving, Julia Baird has written exactly the book we need for these times. ...Show more

Untethered: A Memoir by Hayley Katzen

$31.50 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

When urban academic Hayley Katzen moves to a remote Australian cattle property to live with her farmer girlfriend, she hopes, at last, to find home.   But this is no happy-ever-after tree change. Lecture halls, law reform and the arts are replaced with castrating calves, shovelling manure, fire-fig hting and anti-gas blockades. In a place that attracts people who live by their own rules, Hayley must confront her limitations and preconceptions to forge her own identity.   Set in the unpredictable beauty of the Australian landscape, and told with Hayley Katzen's compelling candour and rigour, Untethered charts one migrant's search for home. Part love story and part off-the-grid adventure, Untethered is a powerful reminder that home can be found in many forms - in love, in family and friends, in ideologies and political movements, in landscapes and communities, and ultimately, in ourselves.   ...Show more

Gulpilil (HB) by Derek Rielly

$28.50 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir | Reading Level: 3 Biography

It's been almost fifty years since a teenage David Gulpilil illuminated screens worldwide with his breakout role in Walkabout. It was the first time we'd seen an Aboriginal cast in a significant role and only four years after Holt's referendum to alter the constitution and give Aboriginal people citizen ship and, subsequently, the right to vote. Gulpilil quickly became the face of the Indigenous world to white Australian audiences. Charisma. Good looks. A competent, strong, mysterious man starring in films ranging from Rabbit-Proof Fence to Crocodile Dundee.But what has marked Gulpilil, despite his fame and popularity, is the feeling that he's been forever stuck between two worlds: a Yolngu man, a hunter, a tracker, who grew up in the bush in Arnhem Land outside any white influence; and a movie star flitting from sets to festivals. Able to exist in both worlds, but never truly home. From the author of the bestselling Wednesdays with Bob, Derek Reilly attempts to encapsulate the most beguiling and unconventional of Australian entertainers, observing Gulpilil's own attempt to find a place in the world. With interviews from icons and friends - such as Jack Thompson, Paul Hogan, Craig Ruddy, George Gittoes, Gary Sweet and Damon Gameau - this unriddles a famous enigma at last. ...Show more

How I Rescued My Brain by David Roland

$28.50 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

As a psychologist specializing in court assessments, David Roland often saw the toughest, most heartbreaking cases. The emotional trauma had begun to take its toll--and then the global financial crisis hit, leaving his family facing financial ruin. So when he found himself in a local emergency ward wit h little idea of where he was or how he got there, doctors wondered if he had had a nervous breakdown--if the strain of treating individuals with mental-health problems had become too much. Eventually they discovered the truth: David had suffered a stroke, which had resulted in brain injury. He faced two choices: give up or get his brain working again. Drawing on the principles of neuroplasticity, David set about re-wiring his brain. Embarking on a search that brought him into contact with doctors, neuroscientists, yoga teachers, musicians, and a Buddhist nun, he found the tools to restore his sense of self: psychotherapy, exercise, music, mindfulness, and meditation. How I Rescued My Brain is the story of David's neurological difficulties and his remarkable cognitive recovery. It is also an account of a journey to emotional health and well-being. In the tradition of Marc Lewis's Memoirs of an Addicted Brain and Jill Bolte Taylor's My Stroke of Insight, this is an amazing tale of one man's resilience, and his determination to overcome one of the most frightening situations imaginable--the fear that he had lost his mind, and might not get it back.   ...Show more

A Promised Land: The Presidential Memoirs (Vol 1. HB) by Barack Obama

$49.99 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

In the stirring, highly anticipated first volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama tells the story of his improbable odyssey from young man searching for his identity to leader of the free world, describing in strikingly personal detail both his political education and the landmark moments of th e first term of his historic presidency - a time of dramatic transformation and turmoil. Obama takes readers on a compelling journey from his earliest political aspirations to the pivotal Iowa caucus victory that demonstrated the power of grassroots activism to the watershed night of November 4, 2008, when he was elected 44th president of the United States, becoming the first African American to hold the nation's highest office. Reflecting on the presidency, he offers a unique and thoughtful exploration of both the awesome reach and the limits of presidential power, as well as singular insights into the dynamics of U.S. partisan politics and international diplomacy. Obama brings readers inside the Oval Office and the White House Situation Room, and to Moscow, Cairo, Beijing, and points beyond. We are privy to his thoughts as he assembles his cabinet, wrestles with a global financial crisis, takes the measure of Vladimir Putin, overcomes seemingly insurmountable odds to secure passage of the Affordable Care Act, clashes with generals about U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, tackles Wall Street reform, responds to the devastating Deepwater Horizon blowout, and authorises Operation Neptune Spear, which leads to the death of Osama bin Laden. A Promised Land is extraordinarily intimate and introspective — the story of one man's bet with history, the faith of a community organiser tested on the world stage. Obama is candid about the balancing act of running for office as a Black American, bearing the expectations of a generation buoyed by messages of hope and change and meeting the moral challenges of high-stakes decision-making. He is frank about the forces that opposed him at home and abroad, open about how living in the White House affected his wife and daughters, and unafraid to reveal self-doubt and disappointment. Yet he never wavers from his belief that inside the great, ongoing American experiment, progress is always possible. This beautifully written and powerful book captures Barack Obama's conviction that democracy is not a gift from on high but something founded on empathy and common understanding and built together, day by day.   ...Show more

Sea Rogue by Williams,Michael

$25.00 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey

$29.99 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

From the Academy Award-winning actor, an unconventional memoir filled with raucous stories, outlaw wisdom, and lessons learned the hard way about living with greater satisfaction. 'I've been in this life for fifty years, been trying to work out its riddle for forty-two, and been keeping diaries of clue s to that riddle for the last thirty-five. Notes about successes and failures, joys and sorrows, things that made me marvel, and things that made me laugh out loud. How to be fair. How to have less stress. How to have fun. How to hurt people less. How to get hurt less. How to be a good man. How to have meaning in life. How to be more me. Recently, I worked up the courage to sit down with those diaries. I found stories I experienced, lessons I learned and forgot, poems, prayers, prescriptions, beliefs about what matters, some great photographs, and a whole bunch of bumper stickers. I found a reliable theme, an approach to living that gave me more satisfaction, at the time, and still: If you know how, and when, to deal with life's challenges - how to get relative with the inevitable - you can enjoy a state of success I call 'catching greenlights.' So I took a one-way ticket to the desert and wrote this book: an album, a record, a story of my life so far. This is fifty years of my sights and seens, felts and figured-outs, cools and shamefuls. Graces, truths, and beauties of brutality. Getting away withs, getting caughts, and getting wets while trying to dance between the raindrops. Hopefully, it's medicine that tastes good, a couple of aspirin instead of the infirmary, a spaceship to Mars without needing your pilot's license, going to church without having to be born again, and laughing through the tears. It's a love letter. To life. It's also a guide to catching more greenlights-and to realising that the yellows and reds eventually turn green too. Good luck.'       ...Show more

The Tap Dancing Knife Thrower: My Life -- Without the Boring Bits (HB) by Paul Hogan

$34.99 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

The icon and legend at last tells his story his way - without the boring bits Paul Hogan first appeared on our screens in 1971 as a 'tap dancing knife thrower' on channel 9's New Faces. The then father of four and Sydney Harbour Bridge rigger from Granville did it as a dare, but when the network's switc hboard lit up, he was invited back. So popular was he with viewers, Hogan became a regular on Mike Willesee's A Current Affair. The rest, as they say, is history. In collaboration with his business partner and best friend John Cornell (who played his sidekick, Strop), he went on to become Australia's favourite TV comedian. His hugely popular comedy shows and appearances in unforgettable and ground-breaking ads for cigarettes, beer and tourism, came to personify Australia and Australians here and overseas, helping to change the perception of who we are as people and as a nation. Then, in 1986, Crocodile Dundee, the movie he conceived, co-wrote and starred in, became an international smash, grossing more than a billion dollars in today's money and earning its star an Oscar nomination. Despite the fact Hoges claimed to be 'retired', many more movies followed, including Crocodile Dundee II, Lightning Jack, Almost an Angel and Charlie & Boots. But even as his star rose ever higher, he always expected someone to grab him by the arm and say, 'What are you doing here? You're just a bloody rigger!' The Tap Dancing Knife Thrower is a funny and candid account of the astonishing life of 'one lucky bastard', as Hoges describes himself. Full of countless stories never previously shared and told in the comedian's inimitable, funny and self-deprecating style, The Tap Dancing Knife Thrower is Paul Hogan's story told his way - 'without the boring bits'. ...Show more

The Happiest Man on Earth by Eddie Jaku

$29.99 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

Life can be beautiful if you make it beautiful. It is up to you. Eddie Jaku always considered himself a German first, a Jew second. He was proud of his country. But all of that changed on 9 November 1938, when he was beaten, arrested and taken to a concentration camp. Over the next seven years, Eddie fa ced unimaginable horrors every day, first in Buchenwald, then in Auschwitz, then on the Nazi death march. He lost family, friends, his country. Because he survived, Eddie made the vow to smile every day. He pays tribute to those who were lost by telling his story, sharing his wisdom and living his best possible life. He now believes he is the 'happiest man on earth'. Published as Eddie turns 100, this is a powerful, heartbreaking and ultimately hopeful memoir of how happiness can be found even in the darkest of times.         ...Show more

Is This Anything? by Jerry Seinfeld

$39.99 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

The first book in twenty-five years from Jerry Seinfeld features his best work across five decades in comedy. Since his first performance at the legendary New York nightclub Catch a Rising Star as a twenty-one-year-old student in autumn of 1975, Jerry Seinfeld has written his own material and saved eve rything. 'Whenever I came up with a funny bit, whether it happened on a stage, in a conversation, or working it out on my preferred canvas - the big yellow legal pad - I kept it in one of those old-school accordion folders,' Seinfeld writes. 'So I have everything I thought was worth saving from forty-five years of hacking away at this for all I was worth.' For this book, Jerry Seinfeld has selected his favourite material, organised decade by decade. In page after hilarious page, one brilliantly crafted observation after another, readers will witness the evolution of one of the great comedians of our time and gain new insights into the thrilling but unforgiving art of writing stand-up comedy.   ...Show more

Heroes Next Door by Johnson, Samuel & Hinton, Hilde

$23.99 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

From bestselling authors Samuel Johnson and Hilde Hinton comes a moving, funny, irreverent, inspiring and big-hearted book that shows us all that resilience and kindness are what make the difference, and that you don't have to travel far to find good people ... often they are right next door. When Samu el Johnson unicycled around Australia, he met some awesome people. And before we had to lock down, he and his other sister, Hilde, were travelling the country talking at schools, community groups and at the side of busy streets to spread their message about how to kick cancer in the face hole. But in the process they connected and listened as people shared their own stories - not just about how cancer impacted them, but about love, fighting fires, making families out of choice not blood, knitting, being there and being surprised by life and finding solace from strangers. They decided those stories should be shared and the idea for Heroes Next Door was born. The result is a moving, funny, irreverent, inspiring and big-hearted book that shows us all that resilience and kindness are what make the difference, and that you don't have to travel far to find good people ... often they are right next door.  ...Show more

Stories of Hope: Finding Inspiration in Everyday Lives by Heather Morris

$24.99 AUD

Category: Biography and Memoir

Heather Morris, author of the internationally bestselling novels The Tattooist of Auschwitz and Cilka's Journey, grew up on a farm in rural New Zealand. On her way back across the paddocks from school, Heather would visit her great-grandfather and listen to his experiences of war - stories he told only Heather. From a young age Heather discovered that people would tell her their stories if she stopped and listened. In Stories of Hope, Heather Morris will explore the art of listening - a skill she employed when she met Lale Sokolov, the Tattooist of Auschwitz. It was her ability to listen that led him to entrust her with his story. Stories of Hope will examine Heather's extraordinary journey, in the form of a series of beautifully rendered tales of the people she has met, the remarkable stories they have shared with her, and the lessons they hold for us all.   ...Show more