The construction of the Overland Telegraph in 1870 is an extraordinary feat of engineering and a wild gamble that nearly went terribly wrong.It was the greatest feat of engineering in nineteenth-century Australia, but it very nearly collapsed in the face of monumental obstacles.The year was 1870, and mail took six weeks to get to England by sea. Australians hungered for the speedy communication a telegraph connection would bring. Engineer Charles Todd promi...

All around Australia, former WRANs and navy men regard the woman they know as Mrs Mac with a level of reverence usually reserved for saints. Yet today no-one has any idea of who she was and how she rescued Australia's communication systems in World War II.Winner, Best 2020 Non-fiction, ACT Notable AwardsAs you climbed the rickety stairs of an old woolshed at Sydney harbour in 1944, you would hear the thrum of clicks and buz...

Alan Turing saved millions of lives. But Bletchley Park wasn’t the only major code-breaking operation during World War II. Down under, there was Central Bureau.Central Bureau — Australia’s own large and sophisticated intelligence network, built from scratch. It was this group of mathematicians, code-breakers, and radio experts who intercepted the travel plans of the architect of the Pearl Harbor attack, Admiral Yamamoto, leading to his ambush and death. Australian ...

David Dufty goes back to the records to uncover the real story of the police officers who pursued the Kelly Gang. This pacey account of the capture of the Kelly Gang reads like a detective story.Shortlisted for the 2023 Danger AwardsHe lurched through the gun smoke, his head encased in an iron helmet, and started shooting. To the weary police in the cordon around the Glenrowan hotel, he appeared like a monster, or a creature from hell.

The stranger-than-fiction story of the ingenious creation and loss of an artificially intelligent android of science-fiction writer Philip K. DickIn late January 2006, a young robotocist on the way to Google headquarters lost an overnight bag on a flight somewhere between Dallas and Las Vegas. In it was a fully functional head of the android replica of Philip K. Dick, cult science-fiction writer and counterculture guru. It has never been recovered.In a story ...

David Dufty goes back to the records to uncover the real story of the police officers who pursued the Kelly Gang. This pacey account of the capture of the Kelly Gang reads like a detective story.He lurched through the gun smoke, his head encased in an iron helmet, and started shooting. To the weary police in the cordon around the Glenrowan hotel, he appeared like a monster, or a creature from hell.For over a century, the Ned Kelly legend has grown and grown...

WINNER OF THE 2022 BRITISH BOOK AWARDS AUDIOBOOK OF THE YEAR: NON-FICTIONThe funny, frank and full autobiography of the nation's favourite comedian.'It's the first time I've done this. Other people have written about me - or for me - but this time it's just my own life in my own words'In his first full-length autobiography, comedy legend and national treasure Billy ...

A dying town, a missing man. One of Australia's greatest mysteries - two whodunnits, twisted together.Larrimah: hot, barren, a speck of dust in the centre of the nothingness of outback Australia. Where you might find a death adder in the bar and a spider or ten in the toaster. Maybe it's stupid to write a love letter to a town that looks like this, especially when it's someone else's town. A town where there's nothing to see, nothing to buy and the closest thing to...

Love, friendship and dangerous secrets in the early years of Cadbury's Tasmanian factory.It's 1921, and after years of working for Cadbury's at Bournville, Dorothy Adwell is on her way to a new adventure in the colonies, helping to establish the Firm's new Australian factory. A promotion and a fresh start are just what she needs after the horrors of the Great War and the loss of her beloved husband. During the long sea voyage, she meets Thomas and is immediately drawn to him. The w...

WINNER OF THE WILBUR SMITH ADVENTURE WRITING PRIZE | BEST PUBLISHED NOVELWOMAN & HOME BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR and A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER**'The perfect escape novel for our troubled times.' PATRICK GALE'If you’re wishing you could be in a faraway land right now, but would accept the alternative route to New Caledonia via a deliciously improbable plot, wonderful characters, sparkling sentences, and too many belly l...

TWO MISSING BACKPACKERS. ONE VAST OUTBACK.DS Lucas Walker is on leave in his hometown, Caloodie, taking care of his dying grandmother. When two young German backpackers, Berndt and Rita, vanish from the area, he finds himself unofficially on the case.But why all the interest from the Federal Police when they have probably just ditched the heat and dust of the outback for the coast? Working in the organised crime unit has opened Walker's eyes to the growing ...

She breathes deeply, trying to quell the rising sense of panic. A detective came to her home, drugged her and kidnapped her. She tries to make sense of it, to imagine alternatives, but only one conclusion is possible: it's the past, come to claim her.Martin Scarsden's new life seems perfect, right up until the moment it's shattered by a voicemail: a single scream, abruptly cut off, from his partner Mandalay Blonde.Racing home, he finds an unconscious man sprawled o...