If you got a call that Batman was assaulting Spider-Man and the person who called it in was Marilyn Monroe, who is actually a 6'3" transvestite, there's only one place you could be: nothing is too weird in Los Angeles. For the cops of Hollywood Station, policing crack-heads dressed as cartoon characters is business as usual. But when there's a diamond robbery connected to the Russian Mafia and a pair of totally clueless and ambitious crystal meth addicts, the pieces have got to be put together by the sergeant they call the Oracle and his squad of street cops. There's Budgie Polk, a twenty-something firecracker with a four-month-old at home; Wesley Drubb, a rich boy who joined the force seeking thrills; Fausto Gamboa is the tetchy veteran; and Hollywood Nate, who never shuts up about movies. They spend their days in patrol cars and their nights in the underbelly of a city that never sleeps. From their headquarters at Hollywood Station, they see the glamour city for what it is: a field of land mines, where the mundane is dangerous and the dangerous is mundane.
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Lake Eyre, at Australia's centre, is a paradox: both hostile and inviting, by turns a pitiless salt plain and a riot of colour and pattern. Its beauty, mystery and astonishing variety are captured here by photographer Peter Elfes who has been travelling to the Lake Eyre region, documenting the people, the landscape, the floods, the animals and wildlife. His spectacular images re-define landscape photography, taking it into the realm of art. Where others have only found an unchanging Australian desert, Peter's lens reveals the spectrum of colours, the dramas and infinite changes which countless artists and writers have sought to explain. With accompanying text by renowned author and critic Peter Timms, this is Australia as few have seen it: a strange and intoxicating land which occasionally becomes a green desert. -
After Singapore falls to the Japanese early in 1942, 70 000 prisoners - including 15, 000 Australians - are held as POWs at the notorious Changi prison, Singapore. To amuse themselves and fellow inmates, a group of sportsmen - led by the indefatigable and popular `Chicken' Smallhorn - created an Australian Football League, complete with tribunal, selection panel, umpires and coaches. The final game of the one and only season was between `Victoria? and the `Rest of Australia', which attracted 10, 000 spectators and a unique Brownlow Medal was awarded in this unlikely setting under the curious gaze of Japanese prison guards. Meet the main characters behind this spectacle: Peter Chitty, the farm hand from Snowy River country with unfathomable physical and mental fortitude, and one of eight in his immediate family who volunteered to fight and serve in WW2; `Chicken' Smallhorn, the Brownlow-medal winning little man with the huge heart; and `Weary' Dunlop, the courageous doctor, who cares for the POWs as they endure malnutrition, disease and often inhuman treatment. Illustrated with black and white photographs. -
The sequel to Below Stairs. From the grand houses of Brighton to imposing London mansions, life as a kitchen maid could be exhausting and demoralising. It’s not just being at the beck and call of the people upstairs, when even the children of the family can treat you like dirt, but having to deal with temperamental cooks, starchy butlers and chauffeurs with a roving eye. Marriage is the only escape, but with one evening off a week Margaret has no time to lose. Between Perce the bus conductor (who brings his mother on dates) and Mr Hailsham the fishmonger (who looks – and smells – a bit like his wares), her initial prospects are hardly the stuff of dreams. But then she meets Albert; a butcher boy-turned-milkman. Could he be the perfect husband? And can she make the perfect wife when, as she soon discovers, years spent serving others don't prepare you for managing your own life? Soon Margaret begins to wonder – how can someone like her ever improve their station? Told with her trademark sharp wit and warmth, Climbing the Stairs is a uniquely observant autobiography of a time when the idea of masters and servants began to lose its sway and of a remarkable woman who grasped the opportunities of this brave new world with both hands. -
Art Linkletter was a Canadian-born American radio and television personality. In 1954, under the spell of Harold Holt's infectious evangelism for Australia as a land of opportunity, Linkletter and some celebrity friends formed a syndicate and prepared to go prospecting in the land where winter is summer and the soldiers wore wide brimmed hats turned up on one side. They were sure to meet koala bears and kangaroos and perhaps see some Stone-Age aboriginals wandering across the vast deserts, but beyond vague trivia, these 'babes' knew literally nothing about the 'land down under.' What they did meet was wild ducks and water buffalo who refused to give up their squatters' rights in the investment rice fields; plenty of sheep and plenty of Australians. A revealing, though dated, character sketch of Australia and its people. Illustrated by Paul Rigby. -
This is the official film tie-in companion: behind-the-scenes with the cast and crew, secrets of monsters and make-up and how Middle Earth was created. With fabulous colour photographs. -
Did you know that the first game of ladies' cricket took place in 1745? Here is a fascinating book for sports fans and history buffs - an early history of the women's game written by two highly-regarded cricketers, Rachael Heyhoe Flint (Baroness Heyhoe Flint, 1939-2017) and Netta Rheinberg, MBE (1911-2006). All aspects of the game covered, in Britain and worldwide. With black and white archival photos. -
Snapshots of Australian history. A selection from Frank Clarke's weekly history radio quiz and discussion programme, The Big Question in Australian History...some of the little known tales from Australia's colourful past, such as: The first female Aboriginal bush ranger; the Governor of New South Wales who kept a white slave; how the Duke of Edinburgh's braces saved him from an assassination attempt; the origin of the expression 'Buckley's chance' and much more. Illustrated with black and white photographs and sketches. -
A unique study of Vietnam from prehistory to 1972 which places the Vietnam War and Western involvement in perspective. Geography and environment have had a profound effect on Vietnamese history - the Vietnamese have had to contend with the power of neighboring China, a coastline that facilitated French conquest and mountains that divide the Red River delta in the north from the Mekong River valley in the south. Also covered is the legendary origin of the Vietnamese and their emergence before the advent of Chinese influence in the 1st century B.C.; the forces that shaped the centralised Vietnamese state during the era of independence after the expulsion of the Chinese in A.D. 939; and the century of French exploitation, during which nationalist movements arose in the north and south.
