Over the centuries, philosophers, artists, writers and musicians have conveyed the therapeutic value and beauty of the world around us. In his beautiful 'On the Grasshopper and Cricket', John Keats claims, 'The poetry of earth is never dead.' The harsh beauty of our desert landscape is captured by Douglas Stewart. In 'The Fierce Land', he says, 'Here the world ends in a shield of purple stone / Naked in its long war against the sun.' Wordsworth, though a lover of nature, also appreciated t...

In the frantic days of the Victorian gold rushes, few made their fortunes. Most did not. Storm Over Bakery Hill concerns some of those people. A widow, endeavouring to create a life after the death of her ex-convict husband. Her son, determined to reject his father's legacy. A policeman seeking revenge. A bullock driver. And those miners, the battlers, who, bullied and frustrated by authorities, were to take up arms and create one of the iconic moments in our history, the Eureka R...

Bill Cotter’s poems and stories have appeared in literary journals and magazines throughout Australia. He has won a number of literary awards, including the International Library of Poetry competition, the Maryborough Golden Wattle Festival poetry competition and the Melbourne Shakespeare Society’s sonnet competition. His work has also been recorded, published and read over the ABC. Some of his poetry, depicting issues of conservation, has also been on display in the Sale Regional Gallery ...

A beautiful new edition of the complete poems of A. B. 'Banjo' PatersonWhen a young man submitted a set of verses to the BULLEtIN in 1889 under the pseudonym 'the Banjo', it was the beginning of an enduring tradition. today Banjo Paterson is still one of Australia's best-loved poets.this complete collection of his verse shows the bush balladeer at his very best with favourites such as 'A Bush Christening', 'the Man from Ironbark', 'Clancy of the Overflow' and the immortal 'the Man f...

The stories of The Lost Salt Gift of Blood are remarkably simple – a family is drawn together by shared and separate losses, a child’s reality conflicts with his parents’ memories, a young man struggles to come to terms with the loss of his father.Yet each piece of writing in this critically acclaimed collection is infused with a powerful life of its own, a precision of language and a scrupulous fidelity to the reality of time and place, of sea and Maritime farm.Fo...

"[This] is a book of great richness, beauty and power and thus very difficult to do justice to in a brief review. . . . The violence is sometimes unbearable, the language rarely less than superb. Dillard's description of the moth's death makes Virginia Woolf's go dim and Edwardian. . . . Nature seen so clear and hard that the eyes tear. . . . A rare and precious book." — Frederick Buechner, New York Times Book ReviewA profound book about the natura...

This volume replaced Ted Hughes's Selected Poems 1957-1981. It contains a larger selection from the same period, to which are added poems from more recent books, uncollected poems from each decade of Ted Hughes's writing life, and some new work. Another notable feature is the inclusion of poems from his books for younger readers, What is the Truth? and Season Songs.

An international bestseller and winner of the 1981 Georgette Heyer Historical Novel Prize, Zemindar is a magnificent, twisting love story, all unfolding against the tempestuous backdrop of the Indian Rebellion.Englishwoman Laura Hewitt accompanies her newly engaged cousin to India, first to Calcutta and then to the fabled fiefdom of Oliver Erskine, Zemindar – or hereditary ruler – of a private kingdom with its own army. But India is on the verge of the Mut...

The renegades had hit three Army posts. All they took were guns and ammunition: until the last raid. That time they got away with a Gatling gun. Now, somewhere out there, was a gang with enough firepower to take on the United States Army. Find them, the Justice Department told Angel. And stop them.What they didn't know was that out of the empty, lawless land, every trigger-happy gunslick in the territory had been given the word: when you see him coming, trap Angel. And kill him.

The renowned poet and author of The Handmaid’s Tale “brings a swift, powerful energy” to this “intimate and immediate” poetry collection (Publishers Weekly).These beautifully crafted poems, by turns dark, playful, intensely moving, tender, and intimate, are some of Margaret Atwood’s most accomplished and versatile works. Some draw on history and some on myth, both classical and popular. Others, more personal, concern themselves with love, with the fragility of the natural world, an...

WINNER OF THE VICTORIAN PREMIER'S LITERARY AWARDS C.J. DENNIS PRIZE FOR POETRYSHORTLISTED FOR THE 2011 WESTERN AUSTRALIAN PREMIER'S BOOK AWARDSDisarming, warm, and always accessible, Cate Kennedy’s poems make ordinary experiences glow. Everything that suffuses her well-loved prose is here: compassion, insight, lyrical precision, and the clear, minimalist eye that reveals how life can turn on a single moment. Musing on the undercurrents and ...

The fourth Crimea adventure for Sergeant 'Fancy Jack' Crossman and his band of brothers Jack Crossman and the privations of war during a Russian winter, in which a few hardy soldiers cause confusion and havoc among the enemy. After the battle of Inkerman on 5th November 1854 the British Army face a terrible winter with inadequate provisions and clothing. In this grim season Sergeant Jack Crossman and his men are billeted at Kadikoi village near Balaclave harbour, with instructions to blow ...