Antiquities & Oddities

//Antiquities & Oddities
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  • Quite a rollicking tale of corrupt soldiers and starving convicts, set in a South Pacific penal colony in 1790.  Into this alien world comes Corporal Phelim Halloran: Innocent and lover, poet and scholar and soldier-by-accident who attempts to make a world for himself in this non-conducive setting. First published in 1967.
  • Philip Kimberley, top ranking British intelligence officer rocks the international spy community by defecting to Russia. However, not trusting his new colleagues, Kimberly leaves behind a hidden dossier exposing the KGB's spy network as insurance.  Years later, drunk and broken, Kimberly is given one last assignment by his KGB superiors - to undergo extensive surgical alteration and re-enter the UK to retrieve the dossier.  With news of Kimberley's death leaked to the media the defector slips back into the U.K. unrecognisable as his former self. With documents in hand Kimberley begins a dangerous game of intrigue that plays MI6 against the KGB with deadly results.  But then Kimberley's nemesis Admiral Scaith brings the former spy's daughter into the game, the rules suddenly change as the final pieces fall into place.
  • The Venture, an old Trident nuclear sub retrofitted for research has picked up an ancient and powerful artifact on the ocean floor and brought it on board.  Called the Hades Stone, it allows the dead to return and join the living. Evil things appear in this world - phantoms. demons and an ancient being called the Stone Keeper, the guardian of the Hades Stone. The demons attack, killing the crew. The portal inside the Hades Stone fills the submarine with the accursed souls of the past.  Jack Bavaro, head of Interceptor Force, has gathered his best operatives  they know the submarine has been commandeered and they know they cannot just torpedo it - a navy attack submarine that tried was instantly destroyed by the demon-ridden submarine. They must enter the Venture and do battle  at the bottom of the ocean.
  • Book II in the Katy series. Dr. Carr's mind is firmly made up. Katy and her little sister Clover are to spend a year away at boarding school. A strange place and far from home, but on arrival the girls have an inkling that it might turn out to be rather different from their expectations. One thing is for sure, it certainly isn't going to be dull with Rose Red as an ally.
  • Nash has more sly and wry observations, this time on the nuclear family.  Chapters include: Man Is The Father of the Child - But He Never Quite Gets Used To It; Daddy, I Want A Pet Of My Own, I Promise To Take Care Of It and Around The House or What Parents Think About When They Aren't Thinking About Their Children.  The following is a sample of the poem, Children's Party - and no doubt many fathers can relate to Mr Nash's observations...

    May I join you in the doghouse, Rover?

    I wish to retire till the party’s over.

    Since three o’clock I’ve done my best

    To entertain each tiny guest.

    My conscience now I’ve left behind me,

    And if the want me let them find me…

    Of similarities there’s lots,

    ’Twixt tiny tots and Hottentots.

    I’ve earned repose to heal the ravages

    of these angelic-looking savages...

  • A Tale of Rome, in the time of Marcus Aurelius...very few major historical characters will appear here. This story concerns itself with the back streets of Rome; the artisans, the growers and the makers; where hucksters and tricksters rubs shoulders with priests and philosophers.  The Encyclopedia of the Novel describes it as a 'playfully comic' depiction of Ancient Rome. So don't worry too much about any historical inaccuracies you may find, it's all in good fun!
  • In 404 B.C., the Spartans demolished the famous Long Walls of Athens, signalling the complete victory of the city of Lycurgus and the subordination of all Greece to the Spartan interest. Yet within forty years, the pride of Sparta had been humbled, their glory gone for ever.  Xenophon lived through this time; despite being Athenian he was intimate with some of the most influential people in Sparta, including King Agesilaus. Here is the on-the-spot documentation of the last years of the independent cities of Hellas, by someone who saw it all.  Translated by Rex Warner. https://cosmiccauldronbooks.com.au/p/imperial-caesar-rex-warner/

  • History as you've never learnt it before - from the invasion of Briton to Alfred the Cake, from Anne (A Dead Queen) to The Merrie Monarch and WilliamandMary who were a pair of Oranges.  A lot of it reads like a Blackadder script with typical English humour. With comic illustrations by John Reynolds.
  • Persuaded by a beautiful Russian Countess to help her flee her loathsome fiancè, Captain Jonathan Clark sails from San Francisco to Alaska, evading cunning rival Captain Portugee - who will unite with Clark to defeat the Russian menace, Prince Semyon.
  • A series of strange events in and around a group of volcanic islands in the Augean with associated happenings in London. On a bright morning,  Ian Caudray, a young devotee of archaeology and of the classics swims from a yacht to one of the islands which he believes is uninhabited.  When a beautiful girl appears he thinks of her as Nausicaa with himself as Odysseus- but she makes it clear she doesn't share his fantasy and wants him gone! Discouraged, he returns to the yacht for breakfast and a light-hearted inquisition from his family - but it's not long before the beautiful lady's secrets come out.
  • Originally published over 300 years ago as The Compleat Housewife - and 100 years before the famous Mrs Beeton - Eliza Smith, drawing on her vast experience while 'constantly employed by fashionable and noble families' compiled this collection of over 600 recipes which had 'met with general approbation'. There are also  remedies and cures for the 'benefit of every accomplished noblewoman' for every ailment from the bite of a mad dog to a case of pimples. This book was not only famous in Britain, but also in America where it has the distinction of being the first ever cookery book to be published there. N.B. Please exercise caution if you should decide to try any of the remedies mentioned; this is a 300 year old book and some of the recommendations and ingredients therein would definitely NOT  be advisable to try.
  • Hiding under the witness protection programme, Rick Jarmin gets nervous when his old flame Marianne recognises him as her fiancè who vanished years ago. But before he can assume a new identity, the man he put in jail is released and comes to pay his respects. Rick and Marianne are thrown together on the run across the country, barely evading the police, gangsters and an amorous veterinarian. Also stars David Carradine, Joan Severance  and Bill Duke.
  • Book III of The Saint vs Crown Prince Rudolph. The Saint had decided to turn over a new leaf.  But he hadn't reckoned with Prince Rudolf - nor with his old adversary's hankering for diamonds! Why would a man as rich as Rudolph care about the comparatively small value of the Montenegrian Crown jewels?
  •  A fabulous collection of over two dozen of Joyce Grenfell's well-known sketches and song lyrics, including Stately As A Galleon, Shirley's Girlfriend, Thought For Today, At The Laundrette and I'm Going To See You Today.  Often cheeky, sometimes sly and satirical, often poking fun at the sacred cows of the English and all have a point to make.

  • This novel spans 130 years and follows the line of women of the Wrotham family, beginning with Sabrina in 1806. The daughter of a socially disgraced, sadistic roué, she is sponsored into 'Society' by her step-aunt - after having had some good manners vigorously instilled in her and her tomboyish ways smoothed out. Her brother Prior's marriage and production of children play a part in keeping the Wrotham name going. The next Wrotham woman is Clare - her brother Anthony's marriage to Harriet brings Charlotte to the line and the last is Gillian Rose, known as 'Jill'. The diaries and letters of the women are fictitious but the times in which the story is set are not, and many historical characters and events of England are brought to the story. As the generations overlap, with the members of each generation subscribing to the beliefs of their day, there is little sentimental romance involved - just a very good story, tinted with gentle romance and enhanced by the backdrop of historic reality.
  • Honouring those who continue to improve our gene pool by removing themselves in sublimely idiotic ways, such as: the woman caught in an American national park, smearing honey all over her small son's face so she could get a photo of a bear licking it off; the man who decided to add a plastic bag to his collection of solo sex toys, and who was found with the plastic bag over his head, the vacuum cleaner still running and himself being very very dead; and the two allegedly experienced twenty-something construction workers who fell to their deaths after cutting a circle in a thick concrete floor without realising they were standing in the middle of the circle. All this and much much more! Also includes sections on honorable mentions and debunks.

  • Funny people, sportsmen...in more ways than one! From the sublimely amusing to the ridiculous, the sporting arena - be it a circket field, a gold course or a billiard table - sees them all. Sport can be a very serious business, but it's the sportsman's ability to laugh at his friends, his foes and himself which sets him apart from those who merely look on. Illustrated by Paul Rigby.
  • The Seven Seas is a series  of poems centred on Britain’s role in colonialism and Empire building. With reverberating lyrics and powerful imagery, Kipling writes of the ruthless means that were often employed to add nations to the glorious Empire, and the subsequent effects upon these colonised nations. Though disturbing and unsettling in theme, Kipling’s lyrical dexterity makes these poems strangely compelling reading.