Incredible tales of rock and roll survival...
My appetite for destruction : sex & drugs & Guns N' Roses / Steven Adler with Lawrence J. SpagnolaNo secret is too dark.
No revelation too sick. But you must have the appetite for it.
After forty years, twenty-eight ODs, three botched suicides, two heart attacks, a couple of jail stints, and a debilitating stroke, Steven Adler, the most self-destructive rock star ever, is ready to share the shattering untold truth in My Appetite for Destruction.
When Adler was eleven years old he told his two closest friends he was going to be a rock star in the world's greatest band. Along with four uniquely talented—but very complicated and demanding—musicians, Adler helped form Guns N' Roses. They rose from the streets—primal rockers who obliterated glam rock and its big hair to resurrect rock's truer blues roots.
From original Guns N' Roses drummer Steven Adler comes the inside story of Guns N' Roses through a new perspective and his own intense struggle with addiction, including the financial ruin he faced after being kicked out of Guns N' Roses and the health problems that almost claimed his life several times - two heart attacks, a suicide attempt, and a debilitating stroke.
The Rolling Stones: 50 / Mick Jagger
On Thursday 12 July 1962 the Rolling Stones went on stage at the Marquee Club in London’s Oxford Street. In the intervening fifty years the Stones have performed live in front of more people than any band … ever. They’ve played the smallest blues clubs and some of the biggest stadium tours of all time. They’ve had No.1 singles and albums in every country that has a popular music chart and have helped define popular culture. A phenomenal half-century later, they now look back at their astounding career.
Curated, introduced and narrated by the band themselves, 'The Rolling Stones 50' is the only officially authorized book to celebrate this milestone. With privileged access to a wealth of unseen and rare material, it is packed with superb reportage photography, contact sheets, negative strips, outtakes and so much more, from every period in the band’s history.
With more than 1,000 illustrations, it also features some of the most rare and interesting Stones memorabilia in existence: international posters, draft record cover art, bubblegum cards, jigsaws and other previously unpublished treasures specially photographed for this volume.
I am Ozzy / Ozzy Osbourne ; with Chris Ayres
On Thursday 12 July 1962 the Rolling Stones went on stage at the Marquee Club in London’s Oxford Street. In the intervening fifty years the Stones have performed live in front of more people than any band … ever. They’ve played the smallest blues clubs and some of the biggest stadium tours of all time. They’ve had No.1 singles and albums in every country that has a popular music chart and have helped define popular culture. A phenomenal half-century later, they now look back at their astounding career.Curated, introduced and narrated by the band themselves, 'The Rolling Stones 50' is the only officially authorized book to celebrate this milestone. With privileged access to a wealth of unseen and rare material, it is packed with superb reportage photography, contact sheets, negative strips, outtakes and so much more, from every period in the band’s history.
With more than 1,000 illustrations, it also features some of the most rare and interesting Stones memorabilia in existence: international posters, draft record cover art, bubblegum cards, jigsaws and other previously unpublished treasures specially photographed for this volume.
I am Ozzy / Ozzy Osbourne ; with Chris Ayres
People ask me how come I'm still alive, and I don't know what to say. When I was growing up, if you'd have put me up against a wall with the other kids from my street and asked me which one of us was gonna make it to the age of sixty, with five kids and four grandkids and houses in Buckinghamshire and California, I wouldn't have put money on me, no way. But here I am: ready to tell my story, in my own words, for the first time.
A lot of it ain't gonna be pretty. I've done some bad things in my time. But I ain't the devil. I'm just John Osbourne: a working class kid from Aston, who quit his job in the factory and went looking for a good time.
A lot of it ain't gonna be pretty. I've done some bad things in my time. But I ain't the devil. I'm just John Osbourne: a working class kid from Aston, who quit his job in the factory and went looking for a good time.
How to make Gravy/ Paul KellyThis extraordinary book had its genesis in a series of concerts first staged in 2004. Over four nights Paul Kelly performed, in alphabetical order, one hundred of his songs from the previous three decades. In between songs he told stories about them, and from those little tales grew How to Make Gravy, a memoir like no other. Each of its hundred chapters, also in alphabetical order by song title, consists of lyrics followed by a story, the nature of the latter taking its cue from the former. Some pieces are confessional, some tell Kelly's personal and family history, some take you on a road tour with the band, some form an idiosyncratic history of popular music, some are like small essays, some stand as a kind of how-to of the songwriter's art – from the point of inspiration to writing, honing, collaborating, performing, recording and reworking.
In 1974 Ian 'Molly' Meldrum was working as a record producer and music journalist when he was offered the chance to host a new music show called Countdown. It was a show that would run for the next thirteen years and become one of the most-loved and most-watched programs on Australian television. It also turned Molly into a national institution (or 'mental institution' as one of his friends put it). During that period he not only became the most influential voice in Australian music, he endeared himself to millions of viewers with a uniquely unpolished interviewing style and a tangible on-screen passion. For better or worse, whether interviewing Prince Charles or Sid Vicious, Molly was always Molly. Along the way he talked, partied, argued, exchanged blows and became firm friends with a rollcall of the world's greatest musical names. Filled with outrageous anecdotes, an incredible cast of musos, deadbeats, transvestites and international superstars, The Never Ever Ending Story is Molly's hilarious, vivid, warm and always compelling memoir of these incredible years.
Scar Tissue/ Anthony Kiedas
In SCAR TISSUE Anthony Kiedis, charismatic and highly articulate frontman of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, recounts his remarkable life story, and the history of the band itself. Raised in the Midwest, he moved to LA aged eleven to live with his father Blackie, purveyor of pills, pot, and cocaine to the Hollywood elite. After a brief child-acting career, Kiedis dropped out of U.C.L.A. and plunged headfirst into the demimonde of the L.A. underground music scene. He formed the band with three schoolfriends - and found his life's purpose. Crisscrossing the country, the Chili Peppers were musical innovators and influenced a whole generation of musicians.
But there's a price to pay for both success and excess and in SCAR TISSUE, Kiedis writes candidly of the overdose death of his soul mate and band mate, Hillel Slovak, and his own ongoing struggle with an addiction to drugs.
In SCAR TISSUE Anthony Kiedis, charismatic and highly articulate frontman of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, recounts his remarkable life story, and the history of the band itself. Raised in the Midwest, he moved to LA aged eleven to live with his father Blackie, purveyor of pills, pot, and cocaine to the Hollywood elite. After a brief child-acting career, Kiedis dropped out of U.C.L.A. and plunged headfirst into the demimonde of the L.A. underground music scene. He formed the band with three schoolfriends - and found his life's purpose. Crisscrossing the country, the Chili Peppers were musical innovators and influenced a whole generation of musicians.But there's a price to pay for both success and excess and in SCAR TISSUE, Kiedis writes candidly of the overdose death of his soul mate and band mate, Hillel Slovak, and his own ongoing struggle with an addiction to drugs.
With the Rolling Stones, Keith Richards created the riffs, the lyrics and the songs that roused the world, and over four decades he lived the original rock and roll life: taking the chances he wanted, speaking his mind, and making it all work in a way that no one before him had ever done.
Now, at last, the man himself tells us the story of life in the crossfire hurricane. And what a life. Listening obsessively to Chuck Berry and Muddy Waters records as a child in post-war Kent. Learning guitar and forming a band with Mick Jagger and Brian Jones. The Rolling Stones' first fame and success as a bad-boy band. The notorious Redlands drug bust and subsequent series of confrontations with a nervous establishment that led to his enduring image as outlaw and folk hero.
As the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame says: "Before the world heard of KISS, the New York Dolls, Marilyn Manson or Ozzy Osbourne, there was Alice Cooper, the original shock-rock band."
When Alice Cooper became the stuff of legend in the early '70s, their shows were monuments of fun and invention. Riding on a string of hits like "I'm 18" and "School's Out," they became America's highest-grossing act, producing four platinum albums and hitting number one on the U.S. and U.K. charts with Billion Dollar Babies in 1973. Their utterly original performance style and look, known as Shock Rock, was swiftly copied by countless bands. Dennis Dunaway, the bassist and co-songwriter for the band, tells a story just as over-the-top crazy as their (in)famous shows.
Reflecting on the Beach Boys' long, fascinating history, this book tells the story behind 50 of the band's greatest songs from the perspective of group members, collaborators, fellow musicians, and notable fans. It is filled with new interviews with music legends such as Brian Wilson, Mike Love, Alan Jardine, Bruce Johnston, David Marks, Blondie Chaplin, Randy Bachman, Roger McGuinn, John Sebastian, Lyle Lovett, Alice Cooper, and Al Kooper, and commentary from a younger generation such as Matthew Sweet, Carnie Wilson, Daniel Lanois, Cameron Crowe, and Zooey Deschanel. Even hardcore fans will be delighted by the breadth of this musical-history volume. Plans for celebrating the golden anniversary of "America's band" include the long-awaited release of 1967's Smile--the most famous aborted album in rock history--and concerts reuniting the group's five main surviving members. The band's music is as influential as it was 50 years ago, and this retelling of how the iconic rock group found itself in the annals of pop culture couldn't come at a better time.
Cold Chisel are icons of Australian rock. Their 2011 'Light the Nitro' Tour sold more than 280,000 tickets, more than their own 'Last Stand' farewell tour and more than Powderfinger or John Farnham's final tours. They have sold more albums since they first broke up than they did before. Khe Sanh, When the War is Over, Cheap Wine, Choir Girl, Flame Trees, Saturday Night, Forever Now...are songs that are a part of our culture. The book, Wild Colonial Boys details the band's history from their cover band days in Adelaide and their struggle to breakthrough in Sydney through to their US and European tours. Included are the stories behind the songs you know, and the songs you don't. More than 2000 shows are documented along with setlists and reviews. Meticulously compiled from management notes, numerous interviews with every band member, band employees, record company executives, producers and a myriad of other sources, Wild Colonial Boys is, in the words of Cold Chisel manager Rod Willis, 'The Bible on Cold Chisel'
Miles Franklin Award 2015
The Eye of the Sheep by Sofie Laguna is the winner of the Miles Franklin Literary Award 2015!
The Eye Of The Sheep is Laguna's second novel for adults and her first to be shortlisted for the Miles Franklin award. Her first novel One Foot Wrong was long-listed for the award and short-listed for the Prime Minister's Literary Award.
The Miles Franklin Award is presented each year to a novel which "presents Australian life in any of its phases."
Congratulations to all the authors nominated for this prestigious prize.
Told from the mesmerising point of view and in the inimitable voice of Jimmy, this is an extraordinary novel about a poor family who is struggling to cope with a different and difficult child.
Ned was beside me, his messages running easily through him, with space between each one, coming through him like water. He was the go-between, going between the animal kingdom and this one. I watched the waves as they rolled and crashed towards us, one after another, never stopping, always changing. I knew what was making them come, I had been there and I would always know.
Meet Jimmy Flick. He's not like other kids - he's both too fast and too slow. He sees too much, and too little. Jimmy's mother Paula is the only one who can manage him. She teaches him how to count sheep so that he can fall asleep. She holds him tight enough to stop his cells spinning. It is only Paula who can keep Jimmy out of his father's way. But when Jimmy's world falls apart, he has to navigate the unfathomable world on his own, and make things right.
The shortlist:
Golden Boys by Sonya Hartnett
The Eye of the Sheep by Sofie Laguna
The Golden Age by Joan London
After Darkness by Christine Piper
Tree Palace by Craig Sherborne
The Eye Of The Sheep is Laguna's second novel for adults and her first to be shortlisted for the Miles Franklin award. Her first novel One Foot Wrong was long-listed for the award and short-listed for the Prime Minister's Literary Award.
The Miles Franklin Award is presented each year to a novel which "presents Australian life in any of its phases."
Congratulations to all the authors nominated for this prestigious prize.
Told from the mesmerising point of view and in the inimitable voice of Jimmy, this is an extraordinary novel about a poor family who is struggling to cope with a different and difficult child.Ned was beside me, his messages running easily through him, with space between each one, coming through him like water. He was the go-between, going between the animal kingdom and this one. I watched the waves as they rolled and crashed towards us, one after another, never stopping, always changing. I knew what was making them come, I had been there and I would always know.
Meet Jimmy Flick. He's not like other kids - he's both too fast and too slow. He sees too much, and too little. Jimmy's mother Paula is the only one who can manage him. She teaches him how to count sheep so that he can fall asleep. She holds him tight enough to stop his cells spinning. It is only Paula who can keep Jimmy out of his father's way. But when Jimmy's world falls apart, he has to navigate the unfathomable world on his own, and make things right.
The shortlist:
Golden Boys by Sonya Hartnett
The Eye of the Sheep by Sofie Laguna
The Golden Age by Joan London
After Darkness by Christine Piper
Tree Palace by Craig Sherborne
Books and Bickies - Discover some great new reads....
Books and Bickies is held each term offering students in Years 3-6 a chance to borrow the new books in the library and share what they have been reading.
Here are some of the featured books you may like to read, you can request them from the Library!
Creepy Caves: Elf Girl and Raven Boy by Marcus Sedgwick
This is the final instalment in the Elf Girl and Raven Boy series by Marcus Sedgwick. The story started way back in Fright Forest when Raven Boy fell through the roof of Elf girl's hut. He was a big surprise!!
Their adventures have continued and finally they reach the Creepy Caves where they must defeat the Goblin King. The Goblin King has sworn "to take over the whole world by tea-time or else!". Luckily Raven Boy and Elf Girl have three trolls, a rat, a magician, a Lord and a flying carpet to help them. Can be read as a
stand-alone but even better if you read all six books in the series.
Footy! by Felice Arena (Sporty kids series)
Felice Arena is back with a new series, Sporty Kids, suitable for newly independent readers. Kids who love Billie B Brown, Hey Jack and Boyz Own will enjoy these short chapter books about different sports. Great illustrations by Tom Jellett capture the action. Footy!???? Is that rugby league?, soccer?, AFL or rugby union? You'll have to read it to find out. We also have Swimming and other titles will be soon. Go to our yellow strip paperbacks to find this great new series.
A single stone by Meg McKinlay
Jena lives in an isolated valley dominated by a large mountain. Seven girls especially chosen and trained by the "Mothers" go into the mountain and navigate its tunnels in search of the valuable mineral, mica, found deep underground. It is dangerous work and Jena is the leader of the group. Jena's whole world is turned upside down when she discovers a secret effecting the whole village. A compelling read suitable for upper primary children 10 years +.
The Amulet Keepers, Book 2 of the TombQuest series, by Michael Northrop
When Alex's mother uses the Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead to bring him back from the brink of death, she inadvertently summons other evil spirits from the underworld. In this book, Alex and his best friend Ren head to London, where people are going missing, victims of the terrifying Death Walkers; rare treasures are disappearing and rain of blood is pouring from the skies. Can Alex and Ren find Alex’s missing mother while they stop a powerful Death Walker from destroying the city?
Dropping In by Geoff Havel
Sticks and Ranga live on the same street, go to the same school and love the same things - skateboarding and PlayStation. When new kid James arrives he soon becomes friends with the boys. He is smart and funny and really wants to go skateboarding with his new friends. There may be a problem – James has Cerebral Palsy and is in a wheelchair. But Ranga may have a solution…three mates, a beat-up old couch, a couple of skateboards and a steep hill ... what could possibly go wrong?
The Precious Ring by Anna Branford
From the author of the Violet Mackerel books comes a new series about Lily the Elf. Lily the Elf finds a beautiful ring. Lily loves the ring and uses it as a wonderful wading pool. But the ring belongs to a small human. Will Lily have to return it? Suitable for readers 7+ and on the shelves in our yellow strip collection. If you enjoyed this Lily story we also have The Midnight Owl with two more stories, The Elf Flute and The Wishing Seed coming soon.
Completely Cassidy, accidental genius by Tamsyn Murray.
Poor Cassidy is starting high school and is trying to create the right impression - you know, not too dorky! Despite her best efforts things don't always work out the way she wants. Her home situation doesn't help: pregnant mother, embarrassing father, older brother who doesn't want to know her (at home or at school!!!). Then on top of everything else she does a test that identifies her as gifted and talented. Can this possibly be true? Lots of humour in this story for upper primary aged kids.
Here are some of the featured books you may like to read, you can request them from the Library!
This is the final instalment in the Elf Girl and Raven Boy series by Marcus Sedgwick. The story started way back in Fright Forest when Raven Boy fell through the roof of Elf girl's hut. He was a big surprise!!
Their adventures have continued and finally they reach the Creepy Caves where they must defeat the Goblin King. The Goblin King has sworn "to take over the whole world by tea-time or else!". Luckily Raven Boy and Elf Girl have three trolls, a rat, a magician, a Lord and a flying carpet to help them. Can be read as a
stand-alone but even better if you read all six books in the series.
Footy! by Felice Arena (Sporty kids series)
Felice Arena is back with a new series, Sporty Kids, suitable for newly independent readers. Kids who love Billie B Brown, Hey Jack and Boyz Own will enjoy these short chapter books about different sports. Great illustrations by Tom Jellett capture the action. Footy!???? Is that rugby league?, soccer?, AFL or rugby union? You'll have to read it to find out. We also have Swimming and other titles will be soon. Go to our yellow strip paperbacks to find this great new series.
Jena lives in an isolated valley dominated by a large mountain. Seven girls especially chosen and trained by the "Mothers" go into the mountain and navigate its tunnels in search of the valuable mineral, mica, found deep underground. It is dangerous work and Jena is the leader of the group. Jena's whole world is turned upside down when she discovers a secret effecting the whole village. A compelling read suitable for upper primary children 10 years +.
The Amulet Keepers, Book 2 of the TombQuest series, by Michael Northrop
When Alex's mother uses the Ancient Egyptian Book of the Dead to bring him back from the brink of death, she inadvertently summons other evil spirits from the underworld. In this book, Alex and his best friend Ren head to London, where people are going missing, victims of the terrifying Death Walkers; rare treasures are disappearing and rain of blood is pouring from the skies. Can Alex and Ren find Alex’s missing mother while they stop a powerful Death Walker from destroying the city?
Sticks and Ranga live on the same street, go to the same school and love the same things - skateboarding and PlayStation. When new kid James arrives he soon becomes friends with the boys. He is smart and funny and really wants to go skateboarding with his new friends. There may be a problem – James has Cerebral Palsy and is in a wheelchair. But Ranga may have a solution…three mates, a beat-up old couch, a couple of skateboards and a steep hill ... what could possibly go wrong?
From the author of the Violet Mackerel books comes a new series about Lily the Elf. Lily the Elf finds a beautiful ring. Lily loves the ring and uses it as a wonderful wading pool. But the ring belongs to a small human. Will Lily have to return it? Suitable for readers 7+ and on the shelves in our yellow strip collection. If you enjoyed this Lily story we also have The Midnight Owl with two more stories, The Elf Flute and The Wishing Seed coming soon.
Poor Cassidy is starting high school and is trying to create the right impression - you know, not too dorky! Despite her best efforts things don't always work out the way she wants. Her home situation doesn't help: pregnant mother, embarrassing father, older brother who doesn't want to know her (at home or at school!!!). Then on top of everything else she does a test that identifies her as gifted and talented. Can this possibly be true? Lots of humour in this story for upper primary aged kids.
Books in translation...
A luxury yacht arrives in Reykjavik harbour with nobody on board. What has happened to the crew, and to the family who were on board when it left Lisbon?
Thora Gudmundsdottir is hired by the young father's parents to investigate, and is soon drawn deeper into the mystery. What should she make of the rumours saying that the vessel was cursed, especially given that when she boards the yacht she thinks she sees one of the missing twins? Where is Karitas, the glamorous young wife of the yacht's former owner? And whose is the body that has washed up further along the shore?
The most chilling novel yet from Yrsa SigurdardottÃr, an international bestseller at the height of her powers.
The rainbow troops / Andrea Hirata ; translated from the Indonesian by Angie Kilbane
Ikal is a student at Muhammadiyah Elementary, on the Indonesian island of Belitong, where graduating from sixth grade is considered a major achievement. His school is under constant threat of closure. In fact, Ikal and his friends - a group called The Rainbow Troops - face threats from every angle: pessimistic, corrupt government officials; greedy corporations hardly distinguishable from the colonialism they've replaced; deepening poverty and crumbling infrastructure; and their own faltering self-confidence. But in the form of two extraordinary teachers, they also have hope, and Ikal's education is an uplifting one, in and out of the classroom.
You will cheer for Ikal and his friends as they defy the town's powerful tin miners. Meet his first love - a hand with half-moon fingernails that passes him the chalk his teacher sent him to buy. You will roar in support of Lintang, the class's barefoot maths genius, as he bests the rich company children in an academic challenge.
This novel is the story of a lie. But it is also a story of laughter and tears, of life itself.
When her chronically unemployed husband runs off to start a crocodile farm in Kenya with his mistress, Josephine Cortes is left in an unhappy state of affairs. The mother of two is forced to make ends meet on her meagre salary as a medieval history scholar.
Meanwhile, Josephine's charismatic sister Iris seems to have it all - a wealthy husband, gorgeous looks, and a tres chic Paris address-but secretly she dreams of bringing meaning back into her life.
And then a dinner party changes the sisters' destinies.
Iris is seated next to a famous book publisher to whom she spins a tale of the 12th century romance she's writing. When Iris charms him into offering her a lucrative deal for her book, she offers her sister a deal of her own: Josephine will write the novel and pocket all the proceeds, but the book will be published under Iris's name.
Mona / Dan Sehlberg ; translated from Swedish by Rachel Willson-BroylesEric Söderqvist, professor of computer science at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, has invented Mind Surf, a thought-control system that allows people with disabilities to browse the web. Meanwhile, Lebanese Samir Mustaf, a former MIT professor whose daughter Mona was killed by an Israeli cluster bomb five years earlier, has just finished creating the most sophisticated computer virus the world has ever seen, for the purpose of launching a devastating cyber attack against Israel's financial system. When Eric's wife, Hanna, falls into a coma — struck by an aggressive and previously unknown virus, after having tested her husband's invention — the doctors are at a loss. Although everyone around him thinks he's gone mad, Eric becomes convinced that his wife has been infected by a powerful computer virus known as Mona, and that the only way he can save her life is by tracking down its creator. What follows is a compelling and high-octane pursuit. Conceptually breathtaking and emotionally powerful, Mona is a story about the good — and the evil — that people are prepared to do in order to save or avenge the ones they love.
'I often dreamed about the moment of the fall, a silence that lasted a second, possibly two, a room full of sixty people and no one making a sound, as if everyone were waiting for my classmate to cry out ... but he lay on the ground with his eyes closed' A schoolboy prank goes horribly wrong, and a thirteen-year-old boy is left injured. Years later, one of the classmates relives the episode as he tries to come to terms with his demons. Diary of the Fall is the story of three generations: a man examining the mistakes of his past, and his struggle for forgiveness; a father with Alzheimer's, for whom recording every memory has become an obsession; and a grandfather who survived Auschwitz, filling notebook after notebook with the false memories of someone desperate to forget. Beautiful and brave, Michel Laub's novel asks the most basic u and yet most complex u questions about history and identity, exploring what stories we choose to tell about ourselves and how we become the people we are.
Cinderella girl / Carin Gerhardsen- Translated from the Swedish
Three-year-old Hanna wakes up to find she has been abandoned. Her family is gone. The house is locked. She is trapped. Meanwhile, a teenage girl has been found murdered aboard the Cinderella, a cruise ship which sails between Sweden and Finland. Detective Chief Inspector Conny Sjoberg visits the girl's home to deliver the tragic news. But as he investigates, it becomes chillingly clear that the girl's younger sister is in grave danger - unless the police can trap a vicious killer. And all the while, somewhere in Stockholm, a little girl waits to be found and rescued...
And then came Paulette / Barbara Constantine ; translated from the French by Justin PhippsThe feel-good bestseller that put the smiles back on French faces. When his son’s family move away (with one last argument on their lips), widower Ferdinand is left with only a sadistic kitten for company on a farm that was built for a family.
Just as loneliness starts to bite, he discovers his neighbour Marceline has long been shivering beneath a leaky roof. He welcomes her to his farm, temporarily of course, and also provides a home for her dog, and for Cornelius, her gluttonous donkey.
As each begrudgingly adjusts to the other’s quirks, yet more new arrivals appear. It seems that Ferdinand isn’t the only one who was all alone, and the dusty farm becomes a haven for lost souls of every age to share their sorrows and set about rediscovering their joie de vivre.
But amidst the newfound hustle and bustle, one final uninvited guest threatens to upset the apple cart once and for all…
My brilliant friend. Book one, Childhood, adolescence / Elena Ferrante ; translated from the Italian by Ann GoldsteinMy friendship with Lila began the day we decided to go up the dark stairs that led, step after step, flight after flight, to the door of Don Achille's apartment...I waited to see if Lila would have second thoughts and turn back. I knew what she wanted to do; I had hoped that she would forget about it, but in vain. My Brilliant Friend is a ravishing, wonderfully written novel about a friendship that lasts a lifetime. The story of Elena and Lila begins in a poor but vibrant neighbourhood on the outskirts of Naples. The two girls learn to rely on each other ahead of anyone or anything else, sometimes to their own detriment, as each discovers more about who she is and suffers or delights in the throes of their intense friendship. There is a piercing honesty about Ferrante's prose that makes My Brilliant Friend a compulsively readable portrait of two young women, and also the story of a neighbourhood, a city and a country.
When famine lifts and the population booms, Gugu becomes the unlikely yet passionate enforcer of China's new family-planning policy. She is unrelenting in her mission, invoking hatred in her wake. In her dramatic fall from deity to demon, she becomes the living incarnation of a reviled social policy violently at odds with deep-rooted cultural values. As China moves towards the millennium, a new breed of entrepreneur emerges with a perverse interpretation of the decades-old law. Tadpole finds himself again caught up in the one-child policy and its unpredictable repercussions on the human price of capital.
Ripper : a novel / Isabel Allende ; translated from the Spanish by Oliver Brock and Frank Wynne The Jackson women, Indiana and Amanda, have always had each other. Yet, while their bond is strong, mother and daughter are as different as night and day. Indiana, a beautiful holistic healer, is a free-spirited bohemian. Long divorced from Amanda's father, she's reluctant to settle down with either of the men who want her - Alan, the wealthy scion of one of San Francisco's elite families, and Ryan, an enigmatic, scarred former Navy SEAL. Amanda is fascinated by the dark side of human nature. Brilliant and introverted, the MIT-bound high school senior is a natural-born sleuth addicted to crime novels and Ripper, the online mystery game she plays with her beloved grandfather and friends around the world. When a string of strange murders occurs across the city, Amanda plunges into her own investigation, discovering, before the police do, that the deaths may be connected. But the case becomes all too personal when Indiana suddenly vanishes. Could her mother's disappearance be linked to the serial killer? Now, with her mother's life on the line, the young detective must solve the most complex mystery she's ever faced before it's too late.
Reading around the Shire: Lulu by Georgie Donaghey Book Launch
Author Georgie Donaghey launched her latest book, Lulu at Sutherland Library last Saturday.
Also present were some other wonderful authors who have written some great children's books you may enjoy.
From left to right top row:
Di Bates, Wei Chim, Debra Tidball, Sandy Fussell, Emma Cameron
From left to right bottom row:
Deb Abela, Georgie Donaghey (Book Launch author), Susanne Gervay, Bill Condon
Di Bates best known books are the Grandma Cadbury and the Bushranger series. This includes Grandma Cadbury's water world.
Her latest book is A game of keeps.
Bright and cheerful Ashley lives with her mum and pet guinea pig, Froggie. Ashley wants a lot of things in her life: a puppy, to be a dancer or actress when she grows up, and more attention from her mum. Most of all she wants her parents to be reunited. When Ashley is faced with major changes in her life she meets Daisy and Will, a couple from 'Aunts and Uncles'. In them she finds a loving couple able to support and encourage her just when she needs it. But can they help Ashley develop the closer relationship with her mum that she yearns for and guide her through the changes ahead?
Wei Chim, author of Chook, Chook, Mei's secret pets
Since the death of Mei's father, her ma has refused to keep animals on the family farm. So when Mei finds two baby chickens, she shares her delightful discovery with no-one but her older brother Guo. Mei does her best to keep her newfound friends a secret, but all does not go as planned. When Ma sells the chooks to the fearsome one-eyed butcher, their fates seem sealed. Is there anything Mei can do to save her beloved chooks from the butcher's knife?
Debra Tidball, author of When I see Grandma. All royalties from the sale of this book are being donated to the Hazel Hawke Alzheimer's Research and Care fund.
Sandy Fussell, an award winning Australian author. Find out more about Sandy by reading Read twelve things about Sandy, and here are twelve more! Why not try reading White crane, the first book in her Samurai kids series.
Samurai Kids is the first instalment in a unique series set in Feudal Japan about a special group of kids training in the ways of the samurai. Brief description of the story: Niya Moto is the only one-legged Samurai kid in Japan, famous for falling flat on his face in the dirt. None of the samurai schools will teach crippled Niya, until a letter of offer arrives from the legendary samurai warrior Ki-Yaga, sensei of the Cockroach Ryu. Niya joins the four other students of the Cockroach Ryu, all with barriers of some sort, and as they learn traditional samurai skills become firm friends. The students prepare for the Samurai Trainee Games. They are in awe of the powerful Dragon Ryu and feel they have no chance of winning. But Sensei knows appearance is not a measure of strength. zCockroaches are only small, but they are very hard to kill,3 he teaches and the cockroaches soon discover that differences can sometimes be advantages. They end up winning the championships. The Dragon Master calls Ki-Yaga a cheat. Samurai honour demands the insult be answered by a battle to the death, but Ki-Yaga demonstrates that some old ways need to change and words are not enough to demand a life.
Emma Cameron, a talented YA author. Try reading her debut novel Cinnamon Rain.
When everything changes, can friendship survive? Luke spends his days hanging out at the beach, working
shifts at the local supermarket, and trying to stay out of trouble at school. His mate Bongo gets wasted, blocking out memories of the little brother social services took away and avoiding the stepdad who hits him. And Casey, the girl they both love, dreams of getting away and starting a new life in a place where she can be free. A powerful and authentic look at teen life from talented new author Emma Cameron.
Deb Abela, best known for her Max Remy super spy series. Book #1: Mission --in search of the time and space machine Her latest book is New City.
A new city offers a new life - but what kind of life will Isabella and her friends find? Isabella and her friends are nervous about what they'll find in the New City. It's inland and it's dry u far from the flooded city they've just left. Will their lives here be as luxurious and carefree as Xavier says? In fact, bleak, uncertain times have brought darkness and danger to New City. The city has been divided in two: the citizens who have, and those who the ruling Major General says have come to steal from them u the refugees who have fled the rising waters, who are imprisoned in a camp on the edge of the city. The kids of Grimsdon once faced sea monsters and evil harbour lords, but now they face new threats. From freakish weather events that whip up with little warning to the fierce misinformation that swirls around the city to the theft of their freedom, now they face the prison-like restrictions and control of the New City. Unlike the refugees, they're heralded as heroes. But what does the Major General really want from them?
Susanne Gervay, author of I am Jack, a series of books focusing on bullying.
“It’s just NO to bullying. NO excuse. NO reason. NO way!
Good kids get bullied. Good kids bully. Good friends get scared. Good kids pass by.
Good people can do bad things.
Bullying is secret business hidden from parents, family, schools, others.
I AM JACK helps change all that!
My fantastic son JACK, who’s a kid just like you was bullied.
Well, it is quite a story … but it has a good ending.”
Bill Condon has been shortlisted for the Children's Book Council Awards book of the year for The Simple Things
Stephen has never met his great aunt Lola, and he doesn't want to. She sends him money twice a year and he always writes back, but Lola is almost eighty - what will they have to talk about? When they arrive at her house, Stephen discovers she's grumpy, scary and really, really old. He wants to turn around and go home, but his mum says they have to stay until Lola's birthday - three weeks away. Left to his own devices, Stephen learns about the simple things in life - like fishing, and cricket, and climbing trees - and the importance of family. Soon Lola entrusts Stephen with a great secret, and he realises that Lola has become more important to him than just an aunt who sends him money - she's now a friend.
Her latest book is A game of keeps.
Bright and cheerful Ashley lives with her mum and pet guinea pig, Froggie. Ashley wants a lot of things in her life: a puppy, to be a dancer or actress when she grows up, and more attention from her mum. Most of all she wants her parents to be reunited. When Ashley is faced with major changes in her life she meets Daisy and Will, a couple from 'Aunts and Uncles'. In them she finds a loving couple able to support and encourage her just when she needs it. But can they help Ashley develop the closer relationship with her mum that she yearns for and guide her through the changes ahead?
Wei Chim, author of Chook, Chook, Mei's secret pets
Since the death of Mei's father, her ma has refused to keep animals on the family farm. So when Mei finds two baby chickens, she shares her delightful discovery with no-one but her older brother Guo. Mei does her best to keep her newfound friends a secret, but all does not go as planned. When Ma sells the chooks to the fearsome one-eyed butcher, their fates seem sealed. Is there anything Mei can do to save her beloved chooks from the butcher's knife?
Debra Tidball, author of When I see Grandma. All royalties from the sale of this book are being donated to the Hazel Hawke Alzheimer's Research and Care fund.
Sandy Fussell, an award winning Australian author. Find out more about Sandy by reading Read twelve things about Sandy, and here are twelve more! Why not try reading White crane, the first book in her Samurai kids series.
Samurai Kids is the first instalment in a unique series set in Feudal Japan about a special group of kids training in the ways of the samurai. Brief description of the story: Niya Moto is the only one-legged Samurai kid in Japan, famous for falling flat on his face in the dirt. None of the samurai schools will teach crippled Niya, until a letter of offer arrives from the legendary samurai warrior Ki-Yaga, sensei of the Cockroach Ryu. Niya joins the four other students of the Cockroach Ryu, all with barriers of some sort, and as they learn traditional samurai skills become firm friends. The students prepare for the Samurai Trainee Games. They are in awe of the powerful Dragon Ryu and feel they have no chance of winning. But Sensei knows appearance is not a measure of strength. zCockroaches are only small, but they are very hard to kill,3 he teaches and the cockroaches soon discover that differences can sometimes be advantages. They end up winning the championships. The Dragon Master calls Ki-Yaga a cheat. Samurai honour demands the insult be answered by a battle to the death, but Ki-Yaga demonstrates that some old ways need to change and words are not enough to demand a life.Emma Cameron, a talented YA author. Try reading her debut novel Cinnamon Rain.
When everything changes, can friendship survive? Luke spends his days hanging out at the beach, working
shifts at the local supermarket, and trying to stay out of trouble at school. His mate Bongo gets wasted, blocking out memories of the little brother social services took away and avoiding the stepdad who hits him. And Casey, the girl they both love, dreams of getting away and starting a new life in a place where she can be free. A powerful and authentic look at teen life from talented new author Emma Cameron.
Deb Abela, best known for her Max Remy super spy series. Book #1: Mission --in search of the time and space machine Her latest book is New City.
Susanne Gervay, author of I am Jack, a series of books focusing on bullying.“It’s just NO to bullying. NO excuse. NO reason. NO way!
Good kids get bullied. Good kids bully. Good friends get scared. Good kids pass by.
Good people can do bad things.
Bullying is secret business hidden from parents, family, schools, others.
I AM JACK helps change all that!
My fantastic son JACK, who’s a kid just like you was bullied.
Well, it is quite a story … but it has a good ending.”
Bill Condon has been shortlisted for the Children's Book Council Awards book of the year for The Simple Things
Stephen has never met his great aunt Lola, and he doesn't want to. She sends him money twice a year and he always writes back, but Lola is almost eighty - what will they have to talk about? When they arrive at her house, Stephen discovers she's grumpy, scary and really, really old. He wants to turn around and go home, but his mum says they have to stay until Lola's birthday - three weeks away. Left to his own devices, Stephen learns about the simple things in life - like fishing, and cricket, and climbing trees - and the importance of family. Soon Lola entrusts Stephen with a great secret, and he realises that Lola has become more important to him than just an aunt who sends him money - she's now a friend.
Books for blokes...
International Men's Health week is 15-21 June. Reading is an essential part of staying healthy, so here are some reading suggestions of books for blokes to read.
Adventure
Quick by Steve Worland
Sent undercover with an unwilling French partner, Billy is thrust into the glamorous world of international motor racing as the diamond heists continue. But as Billy closes in on the thieves a far more sinister threat is revealed. With the fate of a city and the lives of half a million people in the balance, Billy will need to drive like never before to stop the worse act of terror since 9/11.
Book to movie
Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith
A gripping thriller set in Moscow, 1953. Under Stalin's terrifying regime families live in fear. When the
all-powerful State claims there is no such thing as crime, who dares disagree?
An ambitious secret police officer, Leo Demidov has spent his career arresting anyone who steps out of line. Suddenly his world is turned upside down when he uncovers evidence of a killer at large. Now, with only his wife at his side, Leo must risk both their lives to save the lives of others.
Inspired by a real-life investigation, Child 44 is a relentless story of love, hope and bravery in a totalitarian world. It is a thriller unlike any you have ever read.
Contemporary fiction
A short history of Richard Kline by Amanda Lohrey
I woke with a gasp. And lay in the dark, open-mouthed, holding my breath. That feeling... that feeling was indescribable. For a moment I had felt as if I were falling... falling into bliss". All his life, Richard Kline has been haunted by a sense that something is lacking. He envies the ease with which others slip into contented suburban life or the pursuit of wealth. As he moves into middle age, Richard grows angry, cynical, depressed. But then a strange event, a profound epiphany, awakens him to a different way of life. He finds himself on a quest, almost against his will, to resolve the 'divine discontent' he has suffered since childhood. From pharmaceuticals to New Age therapies to finding a guru, Richard's journey dramatises the search for meaning in today's world. This audacious novel is an exploration of masculinity, the mystical, and our very human yearning for something more. It is hypnotic, nuanced and Amanda Lohrey's finest offering yet - a pilgrim's progress for the here and now.
Fantasy/Sci Fi
Inside a silver box by Walter Mosley
"Two people brought together by a horrific act are united in a common cause by the powers of the Silver Box. The two join to protect humanity from destruction by an alien race, the Laz, hell-bent on regaining control over the Silver Box, the most destructive and powerful tool in the universe. The Silver Box will stop at nothing to prevent its former master from returning to being, even if it means finishing the earth itself"
Humour
Analogue Men by Nick Earls
Andrew Van Fleet is 49 and feeling 50 closing in. He's bailed out of his private equity job for something that'll let him spend more time at home, but the house is overrun by iPads and teenage hormones and conversations that have moved on without him. Plus his ailing father is now lodged in the granny flat, convalescing from surgery and with his scrappy bulldog in tow. And then there's Brian Brightman, the expensive fading star at the radio station Andrew's signed up to manage, whose every broadcast offers fresh trouble. He's 49 too and, like Andrew, starting to wonder if the twenty-first century might prove to be his second best.
Biography
Into thin air by Jon Krakauer
When Jon Krakauer reached the summit of Mt. Everest in the early afternoon of May 10, 1996, he hadn’t slept in fifty-seven hours and was reeling from the brain-altering effects of oxygen depletion. As he turned to begin his long, dangerous descent from 29,028 feet, twenty other climbers were still pushing doggedly toward the top. No one had noticed that the sky had begun to fill with clouds. Six hours later and 3,000 feet lower, in 70-knot winds and blinding snow, Krakauer collapsed in his tent, freezing, hallucinating from exhaustion and hypoxia, but safe. The following morning, he learned that six of his fellow climbers hadn’t made it back to their camp and were desperately struggling for their lives. When the storm finally passed, five of them would be dead, and the sixth so horribly frostbitten that his right hand would have to be amputated.
War and Military
The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers
"The war tried to kill us in the spring," begins this breathtaking account of friendship and loss. In Al Tafar, Iraq, twenty-one-year old Private Bartle and eighteen-year-old Private Murphy cling to life as their platoon launches a bloody battle for the city. In the endless days that follow, the two young soldiers do everything to protect each other from the forces that press in on every side: the insurgents, physical fatigue, and the mental stress that comes from constant danger. Bound together since basic training when their tough-as-nails Sergeant ordered Bartle to watch over Murphy, the two have been dropped into a war neither is prepared for. As reality begins to blur into a hazy nightmare, Murphy becomes increasingly unmoored from the world around him and Bartle takes impossible actions.
True Crime
Three crooked kings by Matthew Condon
Three Crooked Kings is the shocking true story of Queensland and how a society was shaped by almost half a century of corruption. At its core is Terence Murray Lewis, deposed and jailed former police commissioner. From his entry into the force in 1949, Lewis rose through the ranks, becoming part of the so-called Rat Pack with detectives Glendon Patrick Hallahan and Tony Murphy under the guiding influence of Commissioner Frank Bischof.
The next four decades make for a searing tale of cops and killings, bagmen and blackmail, and sin and sleaze that exposes a police underworld which operated from Queensland and into New South Wales. This gripping book exposes the final pieces of the puzzle, unearths new evidence on cold cases, and explores the pivotal role that whistleblower Shirley Brifman, prostitute and brothel owner, played until her sudden death.
Crime and thriller
Close your eyes by Michael Robotham
I close my eyes and feel my heart begin racingSomeone is comingThey're going to find me A mother and her teenage daughter are found brutally murdered in a remote farmhouse, one defiled by multiple stab wounds and the other left lying like Sleeping Beauty waiting for her Prince.
A mother and her teenage daughter are found brutally murdered in a remote farmhouse, one defiled by multiple stab wounds and the other left lying like Sleeping Beauty waiting for her Prince. Reluctantly, clinical psychologist Joe O'Loughlin is drawn into the investigation when a former student, calling himself the 'Mindhunter', trading on Joe's name, has jeopardised the police inquiry by leaking details to the media and stirring up public anger.
With no shortage of suspects and tempers beginning to fray, Joe discover links between these murders to a series of brutal attacks where the men and women are choked unconscious and the letter 'A' is carved into their foreheads.
As the case becomes ever more complex, nothing is quite what it seems and soon Joe's fate, and that of those closest to him, become intertwined with a merciless, unpredictable killer . . .
History
Gallipoli by FitzSimons, Peter
On 25 April 1915, Allied forces landed on the Gallipoli Peninsula in present-day Turkey to secure the sea route between Britain and France in the west and Russia in the east. After eight months of terrible fighting, they would fail. Turkey regards the victory to this day as a defining moment in its history, a heroic last stand in the defence of the nation's Ottoman Empire. But, counter-intuitively, it would signify something perhaps even greater for the defeated Australians and New Zealanders involved: the birth of their countries' sense of nationhood. Now approaching its centenary, the Gallipoli campaign, commemorated each year on Anzac Day, reverberates with importance as the origin and symbol of Australian and New Zealand identity. As such, the facts of the battle, which was minor against the scale of the First World War and cost less than a sixth of the Australian deaths on the Western Front, are often forgotten or obscured. Peter FitzSimons, with his trademark vibrancy and expert melding of writing and research, recreates the disaster as experienced by those who endured it or perished in the attempt.
Adventure
Sent undercover with an unwilling French partner, Billy is thrust into the glamorous world of international motor racing as the diamond heists continue. But as Billy closes in on the thieves a far more sinister threat is revealed. With the fate of a city and the lives of half a million people in the balance, Billy will need to drive like never before to stop the worse act of terror since 9/11.
Book to movie
Child 44 by Tom Rob SmithA gripping thriller set in Moscow, 1953. Under Stalin's terrifying regime families live in fear. When the
all-powerful State claims there is no such thing as crime, who dares disagree?
An ambitious secret police officer, Leo Demidov has spent his career arresting anyone who steps out of line. Suddenly his world is turned upside down when he uncovers evidence of a killer at large. Now, with only his wife at his side, Leo must risk both their lives to save the lives of others.
Inspired by a real-life investigation, Child 44 is a relentless story of love, hope and bravery in a totalitarian world. It is a thriller unlike any you have ever read.
Contemporary fiction
A short history of Richard Kline by Amanda Lohrey
I woke with a gasp. And lay in the dark, open-mouthed, holding my breath. That feeling... that feeling was indescribable. For a moment I had felt as if I were falling... falling into bliss". All his life, Richard Kline has been haunted by a sense that something is lacking. He envies the ease with which others slip into contented suburban life or the pursuit of wealth. As he moves into middle age, Richard grows angry, cynical, depressed. But then a strange event, a profound epiphany, awakens him to a different way of life. He finds himself on a quest, almost against his will, to resolve the 'divine discontent' he has suffered since childhood. From pharmaceuticals to New Age therapies to finding a guru, Richard's journey dramatises the search for meaning in today's world. This audacious novel is an exploration of masculinity, the mystical, and our very human yearning for something more. It is hypnotic, nuanced and Amanda Lohrey's finest offering yet - a pilgrim's progress for the here and now.
Fantasy/Sci FiInside a silver box by Walter Mosley
"Two people brought together by a horrific act are united in a common cause by the powers of the Silver Box. The two join to protect humanity from destruction by an alien race, the Laz, hell-bent on regaining control over the Silver Box, the most destructive and powerful tool in the universe. The Silver Box will stop at nothing to prevent its former master from returning to being, even if it means finishing the earth itself"
Humour
Analogue Men by Nick Earls
Andrew Van Fleet is 49 and feeling 50 closing in. He's bailed out of his private equity job for something that'll let him spend more time at home, but the house is overrun by iPads and teenage hormones and conversations that have moved on without him. Plus his ailing father is now lodged in the granny flat, convalescing from surgery and with his scrappy bulldog in tow. And then there's Brian Brightman, the expensive fading star at the radio station Andrew's signed up to manage, whose every broadcast offers fresh trouble. He's 49 too and, like Andrew, starting to wonder if the twenty-first century might prove to be his second best.Biography
Into thin air by Jon Krakauer
When Jon Krakauer reached the summit of Mt. Everest in the early afternoon of May 10, 1996, he hadn’t slept in fifty-seven hours and was reeling from the brain-altering effects of oxygen depletion. As he turned to begin his long, dangerous descent from 29,028 feet, twenty other climbers were still pushing doggedly toward the top. No one had noticed that the sky had begun to fill with clouds. Six hours later and 3,000 feet lower, in 70-knot winds and blinding snow, Krakauer collapsed in his tent, freezing, hallucinating from exhaustion and hypoxia, but safe. The following morning, he learned that six of his fellow climbers hadn’t made it back to their camp and were desperately struggling for their lives. When the storm finally passed, five of them would be dead, and the sixth so horribly frostbitten that his right hand would have to be amputated.
War and Military
The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers
"The war tried to kill us in the spring," begins this breathtaking account of friendship and loss. In Al Tafar, Iraq, twenty-one-year old Private Bartle and eighteen-year-old Private Murphy cling to life as their platoon launches a bloody battle for the city. In the endless days that follow, the two young soldiers do everything to protect each other from the forces that press in on every side: the insurgents, physical fatigue, and the mental stress that comes from constant danger. Bound together since basic training when their tough-as-nails Sergeant ordered Bartle to watch over Murphy, the two have been dropped into a war neither is prepared for. As reality begins to blur into a hazy nightmare, Murphy becomes increasingly unmoored from the world around him and Bartle takes impossible actions.True Crime
Three crooked kings by Matthew Condon
Three Crooked Kings is the shocking true story of Queensland and how a society was shaped by almost half a century of corruption. At its core is Terence Murray Lewis, deposed and jailed former police commissioner. From his entry into the force in 1949, Lewis rose through the ranks, becoming part of the so-called Rat Pack with detectives Glendon Patrick Hallahan and Tony Murphy under the guiding influence of Commissioner Frank Bischof.The next four decades make for a searing tale of cops and killings, bagmen and blackmail, and sin and sleaze that exposes a police underworld which operated from Queensland and into New South Wales. This gripping book exposes the final pieces of the puzzle, unearths new evidence on cold cases, and explores the pivotal role that whistleblower Shirley Brifman, prostitute and brothel owner, played until her sudden death.
Crime and thriller
Close your eyes by Michael RobothamI close my eyes and feel my heart begin racingSomeone is comingThey're going to find me A mother and her teenage daughter are found brutally murdered in a remote farmhouse, one defiled by multiple stab wounds and the other left lying like Sleeping Beauty waiting for her Prince.
A mother and her teenage daughter are found brutally murdered in a remote farmhouse, one defiled by multiple stab wounds and the other left lying like Sleeping Beauty waiting for her Prince. Reluctantly, clinical psychologist Joe O'Loughlin is drawn into the investigation when a former student, calling himself the 'Mindhunter', trading on Joe's name, has jeopardised the police inquiry by leaking details to the media and stirring up public anger.
With no shortage of suspects and tempers beginning to fray, Joe discover links between these murders to a series of brutal attacks where the men and women are choked unconscious and the letter 'A' is carved into their foreheads.
As the case becomes ever more complex, nothing is quite what it seems and soon Joe's fate, and that of those closest to him, become intertwined with a merciless, unpredictable killer . . .
History
Gallipoli by FitzSimons, Peter
On 25 April 1915, Allied forces landed on the Gallipoli Peninsula in present-day Turkey to secure the sea route between Britain and France in the west and Russia in the east. After eight months of terrible fighting, they would fail. Turkey regards the victory to this day as a defining moment in its history, a heroic last stand in the defence of the nation's Ottoman Empire. But, counter-intuitively, it would signify something perhaps even greater for the defeated Australians and New Zealanders involved: the birth of their countries' sense of nationhood. Now approaching its centenary, the Gallipoli campaign, commemorated each year on Anzac Day, reverberates with importance as the origin and symbol of Australian and New Zealand identity. As such, the facts of the battle, which was minor against the scale of the First World War and cost less than a sixth of the Australian deaths on the Western Front, are often forgotten or obscured. Peter FitzSimons, with his trademark vibrancy and expert melding of writing and research, recreates the disaster as experienced by those who endured it or perished in the attempt.
Extended weekend opening hours for Sutherland & Cronulla Libraries
Starting on the weekend of the 4/5 July 2015, Sutherland and Cronulla libraries will be extending their opening hours. The increased hours are in direct response to increased demand from the community.
Cronulla Library will be open from 9:00am until 4:00pm on Saturdays
(an extension of 4 hours on the current closing time of 12:00noon)
Sutherland Library will be open from 11:00am until 5:00pm on Sundays
(an extra 2 hours on the current 12:00noon - 4:00pm hours)
Cronulla Library will be open from 9:00am until 4:00pm on Saturdays
(an extension of 4 hours on the current closing time of 12:00noon)
Sutherland Library will be open from 11:00am until 5:00pm on Sundays
(an extra 2 hours on the current 12:00noon - 4:00pm hours)
June is Audiobook Month! Listen up...
It's audiobook month! Now is the perfect time to listen to an audiobook! Listen while you drive, cook, garden, exercise... whenever!
The Children Act by Ian McEwan
Fiona Maye is a High Court judge in London presiding over cases in family court. She is fiercely intelligent, well respected, and deeply immersed in the nuances of her particular field of law. Often the outcome of a case seems simple from the outside, the course of action to ensure a child's welfare obvious. But the law requires more rigor than mere pragmatism, and Fiona is expert in considering the sensitivities of culture and religion when handing down her verdicts. But Fiona's professional success belies domestic strife. Her husband, Jack, asks her to consider an open marriage and, after an argument, moves out of their house. His departure leaves her adrift, wondering whether it was not love she had lost so much as a modern form of respectability; whether it was not contempt and ostracism she really fears. She decides to throw herself into her work, especially a complex case involving a seventeen-year-old boy whose parents will not permit a lifesaving blood transfusion because it conflicts with their beliefs as Jehovah's Witnesses. But Jack doesn't leave her thoughts, and the pressure to resolve the case--as well as her crumbling marriage--tests Fiona in ways that will keep readers thoroughly enthralled until the last stunning page.
Murder and Mendelssohn by Kerry Greenwood
An orchestral conductor has been found dead and Detective Inspector Jack Robinson needs the delightfully incisive and sophisticated Miss Fisher's assistance. Hugh Tregennis has been murdered in a most flamboyant mode by a killer with a point to prove. But how many killers is Phryne really stalking? At the same time, the dark curls and disdainful air of mathematician and code-breaker Rupert Sheffield are taking Melbourne by storm. They've certainly taken the heart of Phryne's old friend from the trenches of WW1, John Wilson. Phryne recognises Sheffield as a man who attracts danger and is determined to protect John from harm. While Mendelssohn's "Elijah", memories of the Great War, and the science of deduction ring in her head, Phryne's past must also play its part as MI6 become involved in the tangled web of murders.
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel BBC mini series
Thomas Cromwell was a man with a delicate and deadly expertise in manipulating people and events and ruthless in the pursuit of his own ambitions in politics. His reforming agenda in the court of Henry VIII is carried out in the grip of a self-interested parliament and a king who fluctuates between romantic passions and murderous rages.
52 Storey Treehouse by Andy Griffiths
Andy and Terry's incredible, ever-expanding treehouse has 13 new storeys, including a watermelon-smashing level, a wave machine, a life-size snakes and ladders game (with real ladders and real snakes!), a rocket-powered carrot-launcher, a Ninja Snail Training Academy and a high-tech detective agency with all the latest high-tech detective technology, which is lucky because they have a BIG mystery to solve - where is Mr Big Nose??? Well, what are you waiting for? Come on up!
The Water Diviner by Andrew Anastasios
Constantinople, 1919, Joshua Connor, an Australian farmer, arrives in Turkey to fulfil a pledge made on his wife's grave - to find the bodies of their three sons, lost in battle in Gallipoli, and bring them home. In the enemy city Connor meets Orhan, a michievous Turkish boy, and his mother Ayshe, who is struggling to keep her family hotel afloat and rebuild her life after the war. Connor can trace life-giving water under the earth, but finding his sons at Gallopoli seems impossible when faced with the gruesome landscape of sun-bleached bones and rotting uniforms. But a Turkish officer gives the broken father hope where there was none - Connor's eldest son may still be alive. As Connor risks his life travelling into the heart of Anatolia one question haunts him: If his son is alive why hasn't he come home?
The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell
A vast, intricate novel that weaves six narratives and spans from 1984 to the 2030s about a secret war between a cult of soul-decanters and a small group of vigilantes called the Night Shift who try to take them down. An up-all-night story that fluently mixes the super-natural, sci-fi, horror, social satire, and hearbreaking realism.
The Stranger by Harlan Coben
The Stranger appears out of nowhere, perhaps in a bar or a parking lot or at the grocery store. His identity is unknown. His motives are unclear. His information is undeniable. Then he whispers a few words in your ear and disappears, leaving you picking up the pieces of your shattered world. Adam Price has a lot to lose: a comfortable marriage to a beautiful woman, two wonderful sons, and all the trappings of the American dream - a big house, a good job, a seemingly perfect life. Then he runs into the Stranger. When he learns a devastating secret about his wife, Corrine, he confronts her, and the mirage of perfection disappears as if it never existed at all. Soon Adam finds himself tangled in something far darker than even Corrine's deception and realises that if he doesn't make exactly the right moves, the conspiracy he's stumbled into will not only ruin lives - it will end them.
The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton not ready to tackle a 900+ book, try it in audiobook form....
It is 1866, and Walter Moody has come to make his fortune upon the New Zealand goldfields. On the night of his arrival, he stumbles across a tense gathering of twelve local men, who have met in secret to discuss a series of unsolved crimes. A wealthy man has vanished, a whore has tried to end her life, and an enormous fortune has been discovered in the home of a luckless drunk. Moody is soon drawn into the mystery: a network of fates and fortunes that is as complex and exquisitely patterned as the night sky. The Luminaries is an extraordinary piece of fiction, which more than fulfils the promise of The Rehearsal. Like that novel, it is full of narrative, linguistic and psychological pleasures, and has a fiendishly clever and original structuring device. Written in pitch-perfect historical register, richly evoking a mid-19th century world of shipping and banking and goldrush boom and bust, it is also a ghost story, and a gripping mystery.
Breath by Tim Winton coming out a a mini series.
When paramedic Bruce Pike is called out to deal with another teenage adventure gone wrong, he knows better than his partner - better than the parents - what happened and how. Thirty years before, that dead boy could have been him.
St Kilda Blues by Geoffrey McGeachin
Melbourne's first serial killer is at work and only one man can stop him.
It's 1967, the summer of love, and in swinging Melbourne Detective Sergeant Charlie Berlin has been hauled out of exile in the Fraud Squad to investigate the disappearance of a teenage girl, the daughter of a powerful and politically connected property developer. As Berlin's inquiries uncover more missing girls he gets an uneasy feeling he may be dealing with the city's first serial killer.
Berlin's investigation leads him through inner-city discothèques, hip photographic studios, the emerging drug culture and into the seedy back streets of St Kilda. The investigation also brings up ghosts of Berlin's past, disturbing memories of the casual murder of a young woman he witnessed in dying days of WWII.
As in war, some victories come at a terrible cost and Berlin will have to face an awful truth and endure an unimaginable loss before his investigation is over.
The Children Act by Ian McEwanFiona Maye is a High Court judge in London presiding over cases in family court. She is fiercely intelligent, well respected, and deeply immersed in the nuances of her particular field of law. Often the outcome of a case seems simple from the outside, the course of action to ensure a child's welfare obvious. But the law requires more rigor than mere pragmatism, and Fiona is expert in considering the sensitivities of culture and religion when handing down her verdicts. But Fiona's professional success belies domestic strife. Her husband, Jack, asks her to consider an open marriage and, after an argument, moves out of their house. His departure leaves her adrift, wondering whether it was not love she had lost so much as a modern form of respectability; whether it was not contempt and ostracism she really fears. She decides to throw herself into her work, especially a complex case involving a seventeen-year-old boy whose parents will not permit a lifesaving blood transfusion because it conflicts with their beliefs as Jehovah's Witnesses. But Jack doesn't leave her thoughts, and the pressure to resolve the case--as well as her crumbling marriage--tests Fiona in ways that will keep readers thoroughly enthralled until the last stunning page.
Murder and Mendelssohn by Kerry Greenwood
An orchestral conductor has been found dead and Detective Inspector Jack Robinson needs the delightfully incisive and sophisticated Miss Fisher's assistance. Hugh Tregennis has been murdered in a most flamboyant mode by a killer with a point to prove. But how many killers is Phryne really stalking? At the same time, the dark curls and disdainful air of mathematician and code-breaker Rupert Sheffield are taking Melbourne by storm. They've certainly taken the heart of Phryne's old friend from the trenches of WW1, John Wilson. Phryne recognises Sheffield as a man who attracts danger and is determined to protect John from harm. While Mendelssohn's "Elijah", memories of the Great War, and the science of deduction ring in her head, Phryne's past must also play its part as MI6 become involved in the tangled web of murders.
Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel BBC mini seriesThomas Cromwell was a man with a delicate and deadly expertise in manipulating people and events and ruthless in the pursuit of his own ambitions in politics. His reforming agenda in the court of Henry VIII is carried out in the grip of a self-interested parliament and a king who fluctuates between romantic passions and murderous rages.
52 Storey Treehouse by Andy Griffiths
Andy and Terry's incredible, ever-expanding treehouse has 13 new storeys, including a watermelon-smashing level, a wave machine, a life-size snakes and ladders game (with real ladders and real snakes!), a rocket-powered carrot-launcher, a Ninja Snail Training Academy and a high-tech detective agency with all the latest high-tech detective technology, which is lucky because they have a BIG mystery to solve - where is Mr Big Nose??? Well, what are you waiting for? Come on up!
The Water Diviner by Andrew AnastasiosConstantinople, 1919, Joshua Connor, an Australian farmer, arrives in Turkey to fulfil a pledge made on his wife's grave - to find the bodies of their three sons, lost in battle in Gallipoli, and bring them home. In the enemy city Connor meets Orhan, a michievous Turkish boy, and his mother Ayshe, who is struggling to keep her family hotel afloat and rebuild her life after the war. Connor can trace life-giving water under the earth, but finding his sons at Gallopoli seems impossible when faced with the gruesome landscape of sun-bleached bones and rotting uniforms. But a Turkish officer gives the broken father hope where there was none - Connor's eldest son may still be alive. As Connor risks his life travelling into the heart of Anatolia one question haunts him: If his son is alive why hasn't he come home?
The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell
A vast, intricate novel that weaves six narratives and spans from 1984 to the 2030s about a secret war between a cult of soul-decanters and a small group of vigilantes called the Night Shift who try to take them down. An up-all-night story that fluently mixes the super-natural, sci-fi, horror, social satire, and hearbreaking realism.
The Stranger by Harlan CobenThe Stranger appears out of nowhere, perhaps in a bar or a parking lot or at the grocery store. His identity is unknown. His motives are unclear. His information is undeniable. Then he whispers a few words in your ear and disappears, leaving you picking up the pieces of your shattered world. Adam Price has a lot to lose: a comfortable marriage to a beautiful woman, two wonderful sons, and all the trappings of the American dream - a big house, a good job, a seemingly perfect life. Then he runs into the Stranger. When he learns a devastating secret about his wife, Corrine, he confronts her, and the mirage of perfection disappears as if it never existed at all. Soon Adam finds himself tangled in something far darker than even Corrine's deception and realises that if he doesn't make exactly the right moves, the conspiracy he's stumbled into will not only ruin lives - it will end them.
The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton not ready to tackle a 900+ book, try it in audiobook form....It is 1866, and Walter Moody has come to make his fortune upon the New Zealand goldfields. On the night of his arrival, he stumbles across a tense gathering of twelve local men, who have met in secret to discuss a series of unsolved crimes. A wealthy man has vanished, a whore has tried to end her life, and an enormous fortune has been discovered in the home of a luckless drunk. Moody is soon drawn into the mystery: a network of fates and fortunes that is as complex and exquisitely patterned as the night sky. The Luminaries is an extraordinary piece of fiction, which more than fulfils the promise of The Rehearsal. Like that novel, it is full of narrative, linguistic and psychological pleasures, and has a fiendishly clever and original structuring device. Written in pitch-perfect historical register, richly evoking a mid-19th century world of shipping and banking and goldrush boom and bust, it is also a ghost story, and a gripping mystery.
Breath by Tim Winton coming out a a mini series.When paramedic Bruce Pike is called out to deal with another teenage adventure gone wrong, he knows better than his partner - better than the parents - what happened and how. Thirty years before, that dead boy could have been him.
St Kilda Blues by Geoffrey McGeachinMelbourne's first serial killer is at work and only one man can stop him.
It's 1967, the summer of love, and in swinging Melbourne Detective Sergeant Charlie Berlin has been hauled out of exile in the Fraud Squad to investigate the disappearance of a teenage girl, the daughter of a powerful and politically connected property developer. As Berlin's inquiries uncover more missing girls he gets an uneasy feeling he may be dealing with the city's first serial killer.
Berlin's investigation leads him through inner-city discothèques, hip photographic studios, the emerging drug culture and into the seedy back streets of St Kilda. The investigation also brings up ghosts of Berlin's past, disturbing memories of the casual murder of a young woman he witnessed in dying days of WWII.
As in war, some victories come at a terrible cost and Berlin will have to face an awful truth and endure an unimaginable loss before his investigation is over.
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