AustLit

'There is a Turkish saying that one’s home is not where one is born, but where one grows full – doğduğun yer, doyduğun yer. Mixing the personal and political, Eda Gunaydin’s bold and innovative writing explores race, class, gender and violence, and Turkish diaspora – both in Australia and round the world – in her compelling debut.

'Equal parts piercing, tender and funny, this book takes us from an overworked and underpaid café job in Western Sydney, the mother-daughter tradition of sharing a meal in the local kebab shop, a night clubbing with Turkish students, to the legacies of family migration, and intergenerational trauma within a history of violence and political activism.

'For readers of Ta-Nehisi Coates and Durga Chew-Bose, Eda Gunaydin seeks to unsettle neat descriptions of migration and diaspora. How should we address a racist remark on the 2AM night ride bus? What does the Turkish diaspora of Auburn in Western Sydney have in common with Neukölln in Berlin? And how can we look to past suffering to imagine a new future?' (Publication summary)

'In the early hours of 26 February 1918, the British hospital ship Glenart Castlesteamed into the Bristol Channel, heading for France to pick up wounded men from the killing fields of the Western Front. On board was 32-year-old Australian nurse, Edith Blake. Unbeknown to the ship’s company, a German U-boat lurked in the waters below. 

'When Edith Blake missed out on joining the Australian Army, she was one of 130 Australian nurses allotted to the British Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Military Nursing Service in early 1915. Her first posting was in Cairo where she nursed soldiers wounded at Gallipoli. In Edith’s remarkable letters to her family back home, she shares her homesickness and frustration with military rules, along with the savagery of the injuries she witnessed in the operating theatre. Later, at Belmont War Hospital in Surrey, she writes of her conflicted feelings about nursing German prisoners of war even as battles on the Western Front raged and German aircraft bombed England.

'In Edith Blake’s War, her great niece, Krista Vane-Tempest, traces Edith’s gripping story, from training in Sydney to her war service in the Middle East, England and the Mediterranean, and her tragic death in waters where Germany had promised the safe passage of hospital ships.'

Source : publisher's blurb

'"One minute you're a 15-year old girl who loves Netflix and music and the next minute you're looked at as maybe ISIS."

'The generation born at the time of the 9/11 attacks are turning 18. What has our changed world meant for them?

'We now have a generation – Muslim and non-Muslim – who have grown up only knowing a world at war on terror. These young people have been socialised in a climate of widespread Islamophobia, surveillance and suspicion. An unparalleled security apparatus around terrorism has grown alongside fears over young people's radicalisation and the introduction into schools and minority communities of various government-led initiatives to counter violent extremism.

'In Coming of Age in the War on Terror Randa Abdel-Fattah, a leading scholar and popular writer, interrogates the impact of all this on young people's trust towards adults and the societies they live in and their political consciousness. Drawing on local interviews but global in scope, this book is the first to examine the lives of a generation for whom the rise of the far-right, the discourse of Trump and Brexit and the growing polarisation of politics seems normal in the long aftermath of 9/11. It's about time we hear what they have to say.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.

'An epic story of resistance, suffering and survival. Tongerlongeter resurrects a once-in-a-generation leader all Australians can admire.

'Australia has no war hero more impressive than Tongerlongeter. Leader of the Oyster Bay nation of south-east Tasmania in the 1820s and ’30s, he and his allies led the most effective frontier resistance ever mounted on Australian soil. They killed or wounded some 354 – or 4 per cent – of the invaders of their country. Tongerlongeter’s brilliant campaign inspired terror throughout the colony, forcing Governor George Arthur to launch a massive military operation in 1830 – the infamous Black Line. Tongerlongeter escaped but the cumulative losses had taken their toll. On New Year’s Eve 1831, having lost his arm, his country, and all but 25 of his people, the chief agreed to an armistice. In exile on Flinders Island, this revered warrior united most of the remnant tribes and became the settlement’s ‘King’ – a beacon of hope in a hopeless situation.' (Publication summary)

'Indigenous cultures are not terra nullius -nobody's land, free to be taken.

'True Tracks is a ground-breaking work that paves the way for the respectful and ethical engagement with Indigenous knowledges and cultures. Combining real-world cases and personal stories, award-winning Meriam/Wuthathi lawyer Dr Terri Janke draws on twenty years of professional experience to inform and inspire leaders across many industries; from art and architecture, to film and publishing, dance, science and tourism.

'How will your project affect and involve Indigenous communities? What Indigenous materials and knowledge are you using? Who owns Indigenous languages?

'True Tracks helps answer these questions and many more, and provides invaluable guidelines that enable Indigenous peoples to actively practise, manage and strengthen their cultural life and empower future generations.

'If we keep our tracks true, Indigenous culture and knowledge can benefit everyone.'(Publication summary)

'The sea was rough, waves a few metres, falling on top of us. We were just waiting and hoping and praying that we were going to make it.'— Taozen, proud Australian, proud Hazara

'Smuggled offers a previously unseen glimpse into the dangerous and shadowy world of people smuggling. It shares harrowing true stories of those fleeing persecution to seek asylum and reshapes our idea of those —sometimes family, sometimes mafia — who help them find it.

'People smugglers have such currency in Australian politics yet they remain unknowable figures in our migration history. But beyond the rhetoric lies a rich past that reaches far from the maritime borders of our island continent — to Jews escaping the Holocaust, Eastern Europeans slipping through the Iron Curtain, ‘boat people’ fleeing the Vietnam War, and refugees escaping unthinkable violence in the Middle East and Africa.

'Based on revealing personal interviews, Smuggled provides a compelling insight into a defining yet unexplored part of Australian history.'

Source : publisher's blurb

'Tom 'Diver' Derrick VC DCM was Australia's most famous fighting soldier of World War II. Derrick fought in five campaigns, won the highest medals for bravery, and died of wounds sustained while leading his men in the war's last stages. His career reached its climax on the jungle-clad heights of Sattelberg in New Guinea, where he won the Victoria Cross by spearheading the capture of seemingly impregnable Japanese defences.

'The diaries Derrick kept throughout his campaigns, from Tobruk to Tarakan, are among the most important writings by any Australian soldier. Those diaries and all his other known wartime correspondence and interviews are published here for the first time in their entirety. 'Diver' had only a rudimentary education, but his intelligence, humour, ambition and fighting outlook shine through his words.

'Edited and annotated by Mark Johnston, one of Australia's leading authorities on World War II, this book provides unprecedented insights into the mind and the remarkable career of one of Australia's most decorated and renowned servicemen.'

Source : publisher's blurb

''The best books are those you revisit over the years ... and with each visit you learn new things about yourself and about the story.' — Mykaela Saunders on Carpentaria by Alexis Wright

'All writers begin as readers.

'This is an ode, a love letter, to the magic of reading. To the spark that's set off when the reader thinks ... I can do this too. Here, twenty-six writers take us through these moments of revelation through the dog-eared pages of their favourite Australian books. Among them, poet Ellen van Neerven finds kin on the page with Miles Franklin-winner Tara June Winch. AS Patrić finds a dark mirror for our times in David Malouf’s retelling of an episode from the Iliad. Ashley Hay pens letters of appreciation and friendship to Charlotte Wood.

'These and many more writers come together to draw knowledge from the distinctive personal and sensory stories of this country: its thefts and losses, and its imagined futures. Australian fiction shows us what it is possible to say and, perhaps, what still needs to be said.

'Reading Like an Australian Writer is a delightful, inspirational and heartfelt collection of essays that will enrich your reading of Australian stories and guide you in your own writing.' (Publication summary)

''To eat is to build upon our collective story. We use food to say, again and again, who we are.'

'Eating with My Mouth Open is food writing like you've never seen before: honest, bold, and exceptionally tasty. Sam van Zweden's personal and cultural exploration of food, memory, and hunger revels in body positivity, dissects wellness culture and all its flaws, and shares the joys of being part of a family of chefs.

'Celebrating food and all the bodies it nurtures, Eating with My Mouth Open considers the true meaning of nourishment within the broken food system we live in. Not holding back from difficult conversations about mental illness, weight, and wellbeing, Sam van Zweden advocates for body politics that are empowering, productive, and meaningful.' (Publication summary)

'If we are to take seriously the need for telling the truth about our history, we must start at first principles.

'What if the sovereignty of the First Nations was recognised by European international law in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries? What if the audacious British annexation of a whole continent was not seen as acceptable at the time and the colonial office in Britain understood that 'peaceful settlement' was a fiction? If the 1901 parliament did not have control of the whole continent, particularly the North, by what right could the new nation claim it?

'The historical record shows that the argument of the Uluru Statement from the Heart is stronger than many people imagine and the centuries-long legal position about British claims to the land far less imposing than it appears.

'In Truth-Telling, influential historian Henry Reynolds pulls the rug from legal and historical assumptions, with his usual sharp eye and rigour, in a book that's about the present as much as the past. His work shows exactly why our national war memorial must acknowledge the frontier wars, why we must change the date of our national day, and why treaties are important. Most of all, it makes urgently clear that the Uluru Statement is no rhetorical flourish but carries the weight of history and law and gives us a map for the future.' (Publication summary)

'The untold story of a major Australian artist. Regarded in his day as an important Australian impressionist painter, A.H. Fullwood (1863-1930) was also the most widely viewed British-Australian artist of the Heidelberg era.

'Fullwood's illustrations for the popular Picturesque Atlas of Australasia and the Bulletin, as well as leading Australian and English newspapers, helped shape how settler-colonial Australia was seen both here and around the world. Meanwhile his paintings were as celebrated as those of his good friends Tom Roberts and Arthur Streeton. So why is Fullwood so little known today?

'In this pioneering, richly illustrated biography, Gary Werskey brings Fullwood and his extraordinary career as an illustrator, painter, and war artist back to life, while casting a new light on the most fabled era in the history of Australian art.'

Source : publisher's blurb

'Daisy Bates and Ernestine Hill were bestselling writers who told of life in the vast Australian interior. Daisy Bates, dressed in Victorian garb, malnourished and half-blind, camped with Aboriginal people in Western Australia and on the Nullarbor for decades, surrounded by her books, notes and artefacts. A self-taught ethnologist, desperate to be accepted by established male anthropologists, she sought to document the language and customs of the people who visited her camps. In 1935, Ernestine Hill, journalist and author of The Great Australian Loneliness, coaxed Bates to Adelaide to collaborate on a newspaper series. Their collaboration resulted in the 1938 international bestseller, The Passing of the Aborigines. This book informed popular opinion about Aboriginal people for decades, though Bates's failure to acknowledge Hill as her co-author strained their friendship.

'Traversing great distances in a campervan, Eleanor Hogan reflects on the lives and work of these indefatigable women. From a contemporary perspective, their work seems quaint and sentimental, their outlook and preoccupations dated, paternalistic and even racist. Yet Bates and Hill took a genuine interest in Aboriginal people and their cultures long before they were considered worthy of the Australian mainstream's attention. With sensitivity and insight, Hogan wonders what their legacies as fearless female outliers might be.' (Publication summary)

'Bugger, rooted, bloody oath… 

'What is it about Australians and swearing? We've got an international reputation for using bad language and letting rip with a choice swear word or two. From the defiant curses of the convicts to the humour of Kath & Kim, Amanda Laugesen, Chief Editor of the Australian National Dictionary, takes us on an engrossing journey through the tumultuous history of Australia's bad language.

'Bad language has been used in all sort of ways in our history: to defy authority, as a form of liberation and subversion, and as a source of humour and creativity. It has also been used to oppress and punish, notably Indigenous Australians and women. Revealing the fundamental tensions, conflicts, preoccupations and anxieties that have shaped our past and continue to shape our present, the story of bad language is a story about what it means to be Australian.'

Source : publisher's blurb

'COVID-19 has resulted in changes none of us could have imagined, but what happens next?

'If you had asked most people a year ago, they would have told you there was no way that school children could shift overnight to online learning; that it was impossible for banks to offer mortgage holidays; impossible to double unemployment benefits; impossible to house rough sleepers or put a hold on evictions; impossible to offer wages subsidies and definitely impossible to get Australians to stay home from the beach and the pub. But we did it.

'In Upturn Tanya Plibersek brings together some of the country's most interesting thinkers who are ready to imagine a better Australia, and to fight for it. It is a compelling vision for a stronger economy, a fairer society and a more environmentally sustainable future.'

Source : publisher's blurb

'Australia — and the world — is changing. On the Great Barrier Reef corals bleach white, across the inland farmers struggle with declining rainfall, birds and insects disappear from our gardens and plastic waste chokes our shores. The 2019–20 summer saw bushfires ravage the country like never before and young and old alike are rightly anxious. Human activity is transforming the places we live in and love.

'In this extraordinarily powerful and moving book, some of Australia’s best-known writers and thinkers — as well as ecologists, walkers, farmers, historians, ornithologists, artists and community activists — come together to reflect on what it is like to be alive during an ecological crisis. They build a picture of a collective endeavour towards a culture of care, respect, and attention as the physical world changes around us. How do we hold onto hope?

'Personal and urgent, this is a literary anthology for our age, the age of humans.' (Publication summary)

'The annual collection - now in its tenth year - celebrating the finest voices in Australian science writing.

'Can fish feel pain? Does it matter if a dingo is different from a dog? Is there life in a glob of subterranean snot? Science tackles some unexpected questions. At a time when the world is buffeted by the effects of a pandemic, climate change and accelerating technology, the fruits of scientific labour and enquiry have never been more in demand. Who better to navigate us through these unprecedented days than Australia's best science writers.

'Now in its tenth year, this much-loved anthology selects the most riveting, entertaining, poignant and fascinating science stories and essays from Australian writers, poets and scientists. In their expert hands such ordinary objects as milk and sticky tape become imbued with new meaning, while the furthest reaches of our universe are made more familiar and comprehensible.

'With a foreword from Nobel laureate and immunologist Peter C Doherty, this collection brings fresh perspective to the world you thought you knew.' (Publication summary)

'When Katerina Bryant suddenly began experiencing chronic seizures, she was plunged into a foreign world of doctors and psychiatrists, who understood her condition as little as she did. Reacting the only way she knew how, she immersed herself in books, reading her way through her own complicated diagnosis and finding a community of women who shared similar experiences.

'In the tradition of Siri Hustvedt's The Shaking Woman, Bryant blends memoir with literary and historical analysis to explore women's medical treatment. Hysteria retells the stories of silenced women, from the 'Queen of Hysterics' Blanche Wittmann to Mary Glover's illness termed 'hysterica passio'  a panic attack caused by the movement of the uterus — in London in 1602 and more. By centring these stories of women who had no voice in their own diagnosis and treatment, Bryant finds her own voice: powerful, brave and resonant.'

Source: publisher's blurb

'When Katerina Bryant suddenly began experiencing chronic seizures, she was plunged into a foreign world of doctors and psychiatrists, who understood her condition as little as she did. Reacting the only way she knew how, she immersed herself in books, reading her way through her own complicated diagnosis and finding a community of women who shared similar experiences.

'In the tradition of Siri Hustvedt's The Shaking Woman, Bryant blends memoir with literary and historical analysis to explore women's medical treatment. Hysteria retells the stories of silenced women, from the 'Queen of Hysterics' Blanche Wittmann to Mary Glover's illness termed 'hysterica passio'  a panic attack caused by the movement of the uterus — in London in 1602 and more. By centring these stories of women who had no voice in their own diagnosis and treatment, Bryant finds her own voice: powerful, brave and resonant.' (Publication summary)

'There are few Aboriginal icons in White Australia history.

'From the explorer to the pioneer, the swagman to the drover’s wife, with a few bushrangers for good measure, Europeans play all the leading roles. A rare exception is the redoubtable tracker. With skills passed down over millennia, trackers could trace the movements of people across vast swathes of country. Celebrated as saviours of lost children and disoriented adults, and finders of missing livestock, they were also cursed by robbers on the run.

'Trackers live in the collective memory as one of the few examples of Aboriginal people’s skills being sought after in colonial society. In New South Wales alone, more than a thousand Aboriginal men and a smaller number of women toiled for authorities across the state after 1862. This book tells the often unlikely stories of trackers including Billy Bogan, Jimmy Governor, Tommy Gordon, Frank Williams and Alec Riley.

'Through his work on native title claims, historian Michael Bennett realised that the role of trackers – and how they moved between two worlds – has been largely unacknowledged. His important book reveals that their work grew out of traditional society and was sustained by the vast family networks that endure to this day. Pathfinders brings the skilled and diverse work of trackers not only to the forefront of law enforcement history but to the general shared histories of black and white Australia.' (Publication summary)