Your Own Kind of Girl by Clare Bowditch

$29.99 AUD

Category: Chat10Looks3 Recommendations | Reading Level: 3 Biography

ARIA Award-winning singer and actress Clare Bowditch confronts her inner critic in this no-holds-barred memoir. This is the story I promised myself, aged twenty-one, that I would one day be brave enough - and well enough - to write. Clare Bowditch has always had a knack for telling stories. Through her music and performing, this beloved Australian artist has touched hundreds of thousands of lives. But what of the stories she used to tell herself? That 'real life' only begins once you're thin or beautiful, that good things only happen to other people.YOUR OWN KIND OF GIRL reveals a childhood punctuated by grief, anxiety and compulsion, and tells how these forces shaped Clare's life for better and for worse. This is a heartbreaking, wise and at times playful memoir. Clare's own story told raw and as it happened. A reminder that even on the darkest of nights, victory is closer than it seems.With startling candour, Clare lays bare her truth in the hope that doing so will inspire anyone who's ever done battle with their inner critic. This is the work of a woman who has found her true power - and wants to pass it on. Happiness, we discover, is only possible when we take charge of the stories we tell ourselves. ...Show more

Yellow Notebook: Diaries, 1978-1986 (HB) by Helen Garner

$29.99 AUD

Category: Chat10Looks3 Recommendations | Reading Level: 3 Biography

Leigh Sales: "An incredible insight into the thinking and writing processes of one of the greatest writers in Australian history." Helen Garner has kept a diary for almost all her life. But until now, those exercise books filled with her thoughts, observations, frustrations and joys have been locked awa y, out of bounds, in a laundry cupboard. Finally, Garner has opened her diaries and invited readers into the world behind her novels and works of non-fiction. Recorded with frankness, humour and steel-sharp wit, these accounts of her everyday life provide an intimate insight into the work of one of Australia's greatest living writers. Yellow Notebook, Diaries Volume One, in this elegant hardback edition, spans about a decade beginning in the late 1970s just after the publication of her first novel, Monkey Grip. It will delight Garner fans and those new to her work alike.     ...Show more

Miss Franklin: How Miles Franklin's brilliant career began by Libby Hathorn

$26.99 AUD

Category: Australian | Reading Level: 7 Kids Picture Books

A fascinating story about Miles Franklin, one of Australian literature's most significant women written by one of the biggest names in children's literature. This is a story about iconic Australian writer Stella Miles Franklin, namesake of two major literary prizes, during her brief but formative time as a governess in rural New South Wales Teenager Stella Miles Franklin has to work to help support her family. Stella is unhappy in her job and longs for the freedom and excitement of city life While working, she meets a young orphan girl, Imp, who is almost as feisty as Stella herself, and who spurs the older girl to follow her dreams. Inspired by events in Miles Franklin's life Miss Franklin is told by multi-award-winning author Libby Hathorn and acclaimed illustrator Phil Lesnie, and includes a facts page about Stella Miles Franklin ...Show more

A Boy Miner

$22.00 AUD

Category: Australian

Gulpilil (HB) by Derek Rielly

$29.99 AUD

Category: Australian | Reading Level: 3 Biography

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

Jack Charles: Born-again Blakfella by Jack Charles

$34.99 AUD

Category: Australian | Reading Level: 3 Biography

Stolen from his mother and placed into institutional care when he was only a few months old, Uncle Jack was raised under the government's White Australia Policy. The loneliness and isolation he experienced during those years had a devastating impact on him that endured long after he reconnected with his Aboriginal roots and discovered his stolen identity. Even today he feels like an outsider; a loner; a fringe dweller. In this honest and no-holds-barred memoir, Uncle Jack reveals the 'ups and downs of this crazy, drugged up, locked up, fucked up, and at times unbelievable, life'. From his sideline as a cat burglar, battles with drug addiction and stints in prison, to gracing the nation's stages and screens as he dazzled audiences with his big personality and acting prowess, he takes us through the most formative moments of his life. By turns heartbreaking and hilarious, Jack Charles- A Born-again Blakfella is a candid and uplifting memoir from one of Australia's finest and most beloved actors. ...Show more

Teacher by Gabbie Stroud

$29.99 AUD

Category: Australian

A powerful and moving memoir about how the current system is letting down children and parents, and breaking dedicated teachers. Devastating, heart-breaking, enraging.  'Gabbie's story needs to be shouted from the rooftops. She very eloquently shows us why and how education needs to change... Teac her made me laugh and cry. I loved it!' - Kathy Margolis, former teacher and activist. Watching children learn is a beautiful and extraordinary experience. Their bodies transform, reflecting inner changes. Teeth fall out. Knees scab. Freckles multiply. Throughout the year they grow in endless ways and I can almost see their self-esteem rising, their confidence soaring, their small bodies now empowered. Given wings. They fall in love with learning. It is a kind of magic, a kind of loving, a kind of art. It is teaching. Just teaching. Just what I do. What I did. Past tense. In 2014, Gabrielle Stroud was a very dedicated teacher with over a decade of experience. Months later, she resigned in frustration and despair when she realised that the Naplan-test education model was stopping her from doing the very thing she was best at: teaching individual children according to their needs and talents. Her ground-breaking essay 'Teaching Australia' in the Feb 2016 Griffith Review outlined her experiences and provoked a huge response from former and current teachers around the world. That essay lifted the lid on a scandal that is yet to properly break - that our education system is unfair to our children and destroying their teachers. In a powerful memoir inspired by her original essay, Gabrielle tells the full story: how she came to teaching, what makes a great teacher, what our kids need from their teachers, and what it was that finally broke her. A brilliant and heart-breaking memoir that cuts to the heart of a vital matter of national importance. ...Show more

Stay greasy baby by Stevie Belowsky

$29.99 AUD

Category: Australian

Castaway: The extraordinary survival story of Narcisse Pelletier, a young French cabin boy shipwrecked on Cape York in 1858 by Robert Macklin

$32.99 AUD

Category: Australian | Reading Level: near fine

The astonishing and unknown story of Narcisse Pelletier - a French cabin boy cast away in 1858 on the Daintree coast of far north Queensland, where he was adopted by the local Aborigines for 17 years - as a full member of the tribe, and had a family. He was then in effect kidnapped and returned to Franc e, where he settled unhappily, married and became a lighthouse keeper - but his heart was always back with his 'tribe'... ...Show more

Twinning It!: Dance, Acro, YouTube and Living Life to the Fullest by Teagan Rybka; Sam Rybka

$29.99 AUD

Category: Australian

Youtube acro sensations, Sam & Teagan Rybka (aka The Rybka Twins) share their story so far, along with their best tips for balancing friendship, success, fitness and family.

Beneath the Surface by Libby Trickett

$32.99 AUD

Category: Australian | Reading Level: 3 Biography

The brave and inspiring memoir of one of Australian Swimming's Golden Girls, whose extraordinary achievements masked her private battles with anxiety and depression.

Nora Heysen A Portrait by Anne-Louise Willoughby

$34.99 AUD

Category: Australian

Hahndorf artist Nora Heysen was the first woman to win the Archibald Prize, and Australia's first female painter to be appointed as an official war artist. A portraitist and a flower painter, Nora Heysen's life was defined by an all-consuming drive to draw and paint. In 1989, aged 78, Nora re-emerged on the Australian art scene as the nation's major art institutions restored her position after years of artistic obscurity. Extensively researched by the author, Nora Heysen- a portrait is the first biography of the artist, and it has been enthusiastically embraced by the Heysen family. ...Show more