A poignant memoir—and #1 Irish bestseller—about a wayward son's return home to his family's farm, and how he found a new beginning in an age-old world.Farming has been in John Connell's family for generations, but he never intended to follow in his father's footsteps. Until, one winter, after more than a decade away, he finds himself back on the farm.Connell records the hypnotic rhythm of the farming day—cleaning the barns, caring for the herd, tending to s...

Where do thousands of people in wigs, jumpsuits and fake Priscilla eyelashes go each January to swelter in 42-degree heat as they celebrate The King? Parkes, of course – 365 kilometres west of Sydney – for the annual Parkes Elvis Festival. But how, and why, did this sleepy town get all shook up by Elvis? Written by two long-time fans of the festival, Outback Elvis introduces the local characters, the lookalikes, the impersonators and the tribute artists – and the town that made th...

‘Sensational! John Connell has done it again’ – Dean KarnazesFrom the award-winning, No.1 bestselling author of The Cow BookIn The Running Book, John Connell vividly describes a marathon through County Longford, Ireland, where he lives and farms. Because running is as much about the mind as the body, the book is about more than the physical experience. What John sees on his journey prompts him to contempla...

Originally published in 1989, this book analyses France’s distinctive role in international affairs and examines the characteristics of French foreign policy in the Fifth Republic. The introduction provides an overview of France’s role in international relations, then specific chapters look at topics such as French military strategy and relations with the superpowers of the late 20th Century; France and the European Community; immigrant workers and their impact on France’s international pr...

How, if possible, to re-populate declining rural and regional areas? Examining this crucial and complex issue in relation to Australia, this book explores how a particular organization, 'Country Week', has emerged and developed as one means of stimulating the repopulation of declining or stagnating areas. While this is a problem shared by many other developed countries in Europe and North America, Australia's 'Country Week' programme puts forward an innovative range of place-marketing stra...

A hymn to the rituals of farming life from the bestselling Irish author of The Farmer's Son.For John Connell, the lambing season on his County Longford farm begins in the autumn. In the sheep shed, he surveys the dozen females in his care and contemplates the work ahead as the season slowly turns to winter, then spring.The twelve sheep have come into his life at just the right moment. After years of hard work, John felt a deep tiredness creeping up...

This book investigates all facets of Chinese tourism in a single destination, and its fascinating rise and evolution. It provides an overview of the first two decades of twenty-first century Chinese tourism in Australia, covering the early days, when Chinese tourism was mainly guided package tours with tourists visiting standard iconic sites, and its evolution into more individualistic tourism, with younger tourists seeking out sites of particular interest. Many of these ‘new sites’ are pl...

This book offers a fresh analysis of constitutional, economic, demographic and cultural developments in the overseas territories of Britain, France, the Netherlands, Denmark, Spain, the United States, Australia and New Zealand. Ranging from Greenland to Gibraltar, the Falklands to the Faroes, and encompassing islands in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans, and the Caribbean, these territories command attention because of their unique status, and for the ways that they occasionally beco...

This book provides the first wide-ranging account of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in two contrasting island regions - the Caribbean and the Pacific - and in several islands and island states. It traces the complexity of effects and responses, at different scales, through the first critical year. Written by a range of scholars and practitioners working in the region the book focuses on six key themes: public health; the economies (notably the collapse of tourism, the revival of local...

This is the first book to examine the contemporary seasonal migration of Pacific islanders to Australia through the Seasonal Worker Programme (SWP). It reflects on this new age of guestwork from a broad social, economic, political and cultural perspective in both source countries and destinations. In so doing, it offers a critical perspective on different phases of managed labour migration from nineteenth century practices of ‘blackbirding’ to the present day. This book examines why and ho...

First published in 1978, The End of Tradition is the history of four Surrey villages, the Horsleys and Clandons, close to London but isolated and protected from it by the Green Belt. Towards the end of the last century, a period of rapid change began in rural England as a new way of life centred on the nearby towns and cities replaced a traditional rural village life. Estates were broken up, agricultural life declined, village schools and parish councils were set up, and the perva...

This book provides a contemporary overview of the social-ecological and economic vulnerabilities that produce food and nutrition insecurity in various small island contexts, including both high islands and atolls, from the Pacific to the Caribbean. It examines the historical and contemporary circumstances that have accompanied the shift from subsistence production to the consumption of imported, processed foods and drinks, and the impact of this transition on nutrition and the rise of non-...