Showing titles in Australia, New Zealand & Oceania

Was ist das für ein Land, in dem sich fliegende Füchse tummeln und Schweinefußnasenbeutler einst ihr Unwesen trieben? In seinem ebenso amüsanten wie informativen Streifzug durch ein unbekanntes Australien erzählt Bill Bryson von den historischen Hintergründen der Entdeckung dieses faszinierenden Kontinents...

This book is the first comprehensive account of how Australia attained the world's highest living standards within a few decades of European settlement, and how the nation has sustained an enviable level of income to the present. Beginning with the Aboriginal economy at the end of the 18th century, Ian McLean argues that Australia's remarkable prosperity across nearly two centuries was reached and maintained by several shifting factors.

Take a self-guided audio walk from Sydney's Circular Quay -- the spot where European Australia had its beginnings. The walk takes in the Sydney Harbour Bridge, the Sydney Opera House and winds its way along Sydney Harbour into the Royal Botanic Gardens. It finishes at Mrs Macquarie's Chair, with views of Fort Denison, Garden Island and down harbour. As you enjoy spectacular views and iconic landmarks, you'll enjoy a breezy commentary on 200 years of Australian history.

In the late 1970s, criminal mastermind John Milligan and his associates conspired to import heroin into Far North Queensland via a remote mountaintop airdrop. In a story that is stranger than fiction, it took them three trips through dense jungle to locate the heroin, but they only recovered one of the two packages. When narcotics Agent John Shobbrook took on the investigation of this audacious crime, codenamed 'Operation Jungle', his career was on the rise within the Federal Bureau of Narcotics.

You’ve probably heard that famous 'Well may we say' speech made by Australian prime minister Gough Whitlam on the day he was sacked by the queen’s representative, or seen the grainy footage from the steps of old parliament house. But do you properly understand the extraordinary events leading up to the most dramatic day in Australian political history? How did The Dismissal actually happen? This audio series takes you inside the highest circles of power to uncover pieces of this story that have never been told before.

Australians will gamble on anything, from two flies crawling up a wall to less important things like federal elections. Thanks to the internet, mobile phones and gambling tax loving Federal and State governments, Australians can indulge their love of a punt no matter what they're doing. Aussies...

From the marriage equality debate to the COVID-19 lockdown, ‘free speech’ has become the new battleground in Australian society. What does the furore over one footballer’s social media postings reveal about how it got that way? For a period in 2019, a tweet from rugby player Israel Folau...

Australia's greatest escape stories from two world wars Australia’s Greatest Escapes is a collection of stories about the most hazardous aspect of the prisoner of war experience – escape. Here is all the adventure, suspense and courage of ordinary Australians who defied their captors; men...

The Buxtons are one of only a few families that were successful in the gold rush era and are still prominent today. They have survived and prospered through two world wars, two calamitous depressions, numerous recessions, and any number of political and economic crises. In The Buxtons, Peter Yule brings their story to life, tracing how this one family left a distinctive mark on Melbourne’s landscape.

For the 10 years after 1902, when Australia’s suffrage campaigners won the vote for white women, the world looked to this trailblazing young democracy for inspiration. Clare Wright’s epic new history tells the story of that victory - and of Australia’s role at the forefront of the subsequent international struggle - through the eyes of five remarkable players: the redoubtable Vida Goldstein, flamboyant Nellie Martel, indomitable Dora Montefiore, daring Muriel Matters and self-effacing artist Dora Meeson Coates....

When Mark McKenna set out to write a history of the centre of Australia, he had no idea what he would discover. One event in 1934 - the shooting at Uluru of Aboriginal man Yokunnuna by white policeman Bill McKinnon, and subsequent Commonwealth inquiry - stood out as a mirror of racial politics in the Northern Territory at the time. But then, through speaking with the families of both killer and victim, McKenna unearthed new evidence that transformed the historical record and the meaning of the event for today.

What drives veterans, military experts and forensic investigators to dedicate years to search for and identify the remains of fallen warriors? What does it mean to the families of the dead to be able to lay them to rest? Over thirty five thousand Australian soldiers and airmen are still listed...

The extraordinary story of a headmaster turned cryptographer, and our top-secret war with the Kaiser's Reich. On 11 August 1914, just days after war had been declared, Australian Captain J.T. Richardson boarded a German merchant vessel fleeing Melbourne's Port Phillip and audaciously seized a...

Tall tales of bushmen, bulldozers and back-country blokes 'It was the mid-1970s and I was about eight, I thought it was completely normal for your old man to pull out a high-powered deer-hunting rifle and fire it through the kitchen door from the breakfast table...' In the 1970s and 80s, Barry...

Australia es mucho más que un enorme país. Y mucho más que la isla más grande del mundo. Es un universo aparte. Árida, con una climatología extrema y una fauna atípica (y en muchos casos muy peligrosa), Australia también tiene gentes hospitalarias, ciudades muy modernas y otros muchos secretos por descubrir. ¿Cómo no enamorarse de un lugar fascinante que no se parece a ningún otro?

From the Aboriginal Dreamtime to the arrival of the First Fleet, from the gold rushes to the world wars, this audiobook is a magical tale full of wonder and enchantment. And with a narrative style that will transport you to another world, you'll feel like you're right there, watching history unfold before your very eyes.

After I'd got him out of harm's way, I dived back in yet again and swam out past the surf-break, out to where the other two lads were floundering. Then, one at a time, I took them back onto the rocks – all done against the raging rip and wild surf. By then an hour or so had passed. Still, severe cuts, bruises and abrasions aside, I'd successfully saved the lives of the four young people who, in all probability, would've otherwise drowned.

Popular culture has mythologised the Dunera Boys–but who were the real men who sailed on the infamous ship, and how did the voyage transform their lives? Art historian Tonia Eckfeld draws on a deeply personal history to tell the story of her father and her uncle, Jewish refugees whose lives were shaped indelibly by their wartime experiences and internment–each to very different outcomes.

Am frühen Morgen des 20. Januars 1988 hatte Faye Knowles mit ihren drei Söhnen eine Begegnung mit einem unbekannten Flugobjekt auf einer einsamen Wüstenstraße zwischen Madura und Mundrabilla in Westaustralien. In diesem Hörspiel gibt es eine ausführliche Zusammenfassung der Geschehnisse zu hören.

Prepare to embark on an unforgettable journey in "Legacy of Valor," a compelling book that brings to life the remarkable stories of courage, resilience, and sacrifice from the heroes who fought on the frontlines during World War II. Step back in time and witness history through the eyes of those who lived it. This riveting collection of true tales takes you on an epic adventure, from the deserts of North Africa to the hills of Italy, offering a profound insight into the experiences of those who shaped the course of a world at war.