Murriyang
Dear Village Murriyang 2 $24.99
Murriyang Shortlisted for the 2025 ABIA Awards, Social Impact Book of the YearStan Grant is talking to his country in a new way. In his most poetic and inspiring work yet, he offers a means of moving beyond the binaries and embracing a path to peace and forgiveness, rooted in the Wiradjuri spiritual practice of Yindyamarra – deep silence and respect.Murriyang, in part Grant’s response to the Voice referendum, eschews politics for love. In this gorgeous, grace-filled book, he zooms out to reflect on the biggest questions, ranging across the history, literature, theology, music and art that has shaped him. Setting aside anger for kindness, he reaches past the secular to the sacred and transcendent.Informed by spiritual thinkers from around the world, Murriyang is a Wiradjuri prayer in one long uninterrupted breath, challenging Western notions of linear time in favour of deep, circular time – the Dreaming.Murriyang is also very personal, each meditation interleaved with a memory of Grant’s father, a Wiradjuri cultural leader. It asks how any of us can say goodbye to those we love.This is a book for our current moment, and something for the ages.
My Father Bryce
Dear Village My Father Bryce $34.99
My Father Bryce Dynamic, complex, driven: Bryce Courtenay was all of these as well as one of Australia's most beloved authors. To his son Adam, he was larger than life, mercurial, and impossible to know completely. In this moving, unforgettable memoir, Adam searches for the real Bryce.Bryce Courtenay was one of Australia's highest-selling and most-loved authors as well as a larger-than-life character. From his first book, The Power of One, he captivated readers. With his third, the non-fiction title April Fool's Day, he captured their hearts. Many of his fans would have thought they knew him, and they did - they knew the version of him that he wanted to present to the world.Bryce's son Adam also knew that version. And he knew the Bryce the rest of the world only glimpsed, or never saw at all. His father was a natural born storyteller and occasional fabulist whose tales never quite felt true. He was a man who forever publicly grieved the loss of his son Damon, the subject of April Fool's Day, but who seemed reluctant to connect with his remaining two sons.Several years after his death, Bryce still looms large in Adam's life. In seeking to understand his father, who made so many people happy with his books, Adam recounts his own 1960s and 1970s childhood, Bryce's career in advertising and his metamorphosis into bestselling novelist. In the years after The Power of One, Bryce became a household name even as his personal life was plagued by tragedy and heartbreak - some of his own making. All the while Adam did his best to love his father and hang on through the wild ride of his life.
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My Year Of Psychedelics
Dear Village My Year Of Psychedelics $34.99
Exploring first-hand the amazing potential of mushrooms, MDMA, LSD and other life-enhancing substances.
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Nancy Wake
Dear Village Nancy Wake $27.99
Nancy Wake The gripping true story of the woman who became the Gestapo's most wanted spyIn the early 1930s, Nancy Wake was a young woman enjoying a bohemian life in Paris. By the end of the Second World War, she was the Gestapo's most wanted person.As a naïve, young journalist, Nancy Wake witnessed a horrific scene of Nazi violence in a Viennese street. From that moment, she declared that she would do everything in her power to rid Europe of the Nazis. What began as a courier job here and there became a highly successful escape network for Allied soldiers, perfectly camouflaged by Nancy's high-society life in Marseille.Her network was soon so successful - and so notorious - that she was forced to flee France to escape the Gestapo, who had dubbed her "the white mouse" for her knack of slipping through its traps. But Nancy was a passionate enemy of the Nazis and refused to stay away. Supplying weapons and training members of a powerful underground fighting force, organising Allied parachute drops, cycling four hundred kilometres across a mountain range to find a new transmitting radio - nothing seemed too difficult in her fight against the Nazis. Peter FitzSimons reveals Nancy Wake's compelling story, a tale of an ordinary woman doing extraordinary things.For fans of A Woman of No Importance and Code Name: Lise comes the true story behind the historical fiction novels Code Name Helène and Liberation.
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Ned Kelly
Dear Village Ned Kelly $24.99
History comes to life with Peter FitzSimonsLove him or loathe him, Ned Kelly has been at the heart of Australian culture and identity since he and his gang were tracked down in bushland by the Victorian police and came out fighting, dressed in bulletproof iron armour made from farmers' ploughs.Historians still disagree over virtually every aspect of the eldest Kelly boy's brushes with the law. Did he or did he not shoot Constable Fitzpatrick at their family home? Was he a lawless thug or a noble Robin Hood, a remorseless killer or a crusader against oppression and discrimination? Was he even a political revolutionary, an Australian republican channelling the spirit of Eureka?Peter FitzSimons, bestselling chronicler of many of the great defining moments and people of this nation's history, is the perfect person to tell this most iconic of all Australian stories. From Kelly's early days in Beveridge, Victoria, in the mid-1800s, to the Felons' Apprehension Act, which made it possible for anyone to shoot the Kelly gang, to Ned's appearance in his now-famous armour, prompting the shocked and bewildered police to exclaim 'He is the devil!' and 'He is the bunyip!', FitzSimons brings the history of Ned Kelly and his gang exuberantly to life, weighing in on all of the myths, legends and controversies generated by this compelling and divisive Irish-Australian rebel.______________________________________________PRAISE FOR PETER FITZSIMONS'Peter FitzSimons is an Australian phenomenon.' The Canberra Times' FitzSimons knows how to make words race like eager sled dogs on their homeward run.' Newcastle Herald'Meticulously researched, well-written and incredibly presented.' Weekend Notes
No Secrets
Dear Village No Secrets $35.99
No Secrets Imagine stepping into a packed Australian pub in the mid-1970s and the late 1980s - the heyday of the pub-rock music scene - where the air was thick with the unmistakable scent of beer, sweat and pot, and the atmosphere was electrifying. Doc Neeson, charismatic lead singer of The Angels, famously captured this raw energy when he quipped, 'I know you're out there. I can smell you!'Australian pubs were then the epicentre of a musical revolution soundtracked by a heady mix of growling guitars, thumping bass, pounding drums and adoring fans. This golden era gave birth to some of the country's most iconic and beloved rock music - and Graham 'Buzz' Bidstrup was at the heart of it all.In No Secrets, Buzz recounts his journey from his first drum kit to becoming a powerhouse drummer, session musician, songwriter, producer and manager. An original member of The Angels/Angel City, GANGgajang and The Party Boys, he's also made music with a who's who of rock royalty including Jimmy Barnes, Mondo Rock, Australian Crawl, Richard Clapton, Don Walker's Catfish, Swanee, The Stetsons and even Tiny Tim. Buzz managed and produced albums for young artists like Nathan Cavaleri and Diana Anaid, The Numbers and The Riptides, and spent a life-changing thirteen years managing and producing the legendary Indigenous entertainer Jimmy Little AO.Navigating the complexities of artist management, royalty disputes and the music industry's drug culture, No Secrets offers an insider's perspective on band dynamics and the realities of life on the road. From sharing the stage with mates to touring alongside David Bowie, The Kinks, and Cheap Trick, Buzz eloquently describes how the journey to stardom can often descend into struggles with egos, unfulfilled dreams and personal challenges.
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Not Just The Wife Of The General Manager
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Dear Village Not Just The Wife Of The General Manager $18.50 $36.99
Not Just the Wife of the General Manager is a rollicking memoir of one woman’s life on outback cattle stations, and an homage to the many unsung women like her. It was the 1980s and Sally was in her mid 20s when she returned from a backpacking sojourn and hitchhiked to Australia’s far north. But instead of moving back to Canberra as planned, she stayed. After marrying a cattle station manager, Sally lived and worked with him on various stations until she was 50, ingraining herself into the lives of the characters who inhabited these isolated places. With wit and sass, Sally tells the story of how she was so much more than just a wife of a station manager (despite what some of the top end blokes thought). Among other things, she was a nurse (dealing with local accidents, assisting the Flying Doctor service and making emergency 400 km round trips through the outback with sick children), a mother (bringing up several children, not all her own), a travel agent, a social secretary, a host and an organiser (including of Kerry Packer’s New Year’s Eve parties). This is a story about adventure, resilience, the unexpected journeys we need to go on to find ourselves, and having the courage to do something for yourself. In Sally's words: 'Life’s like that, fellas. You may spend a lifetime trying to find yourself but, at the end of the day, you've been there all along.'
Not My Shame
Dear Village Not My Shame $32.99
Not My ShameA testament to the power of female courage and strength, this intensely personal memoir reveals how one woman confronted her dark past and broke free from lifelong trauma bonds. Not content with only healing herself, author Martina Zangger has dedicated her life to helping other sexual assault survivors as they navigate both their healing journeys and the complexities of the criminal justice system. Her frankness in narrating her startling life choices displays the potency of shedding shame and the freedom that follows.Sexually abused by her grandfather and uncle as a small child, Martina’s early years became the foundation for a life of struggles and wrong turns. Like many victim survivors, Martina kept her trauma a secret—a suppression that led her into sex work and ultimately into the grip of the notorious cult of the Indian guru Rajneesh.For decades, Martina believed she was a magnet for abusers; that the sexual violence she endured was somehow her fault. But healing has allowed Martina to bravely face the tragedies she once buried, and to place the blame where it belongs. No longer silenced by shame, Martina’s greatest discovery is that love doesn’t have to be dangerous, that it can be respectful and kind instead.This is her story, and it is a story of hope for all survivors.
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Nothing Bad Ever Happens Here
Dear Village Nothing Bad Ever Happens Here $34.99
Nothing Bad Ever Happens HereA deeply personal collection filled with reflections on love, death, creativity and healing, from the award-winning author of Bruny and The Museum of Modern Love.
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On Fathers Day
Dear Village On Fathers Day $34.99
A heartbreaking account of enduring suffering and loss.When Cindy Gambino dropped her three boys off at their dad's on Father’s Day 2005 she had no idea she would never see them again. By day’s end, their bodies lay at the bottom of an icy dam, a tragedy that sparked one of the most controversial and prolonged murder cases in Australian history.Award-winning author and journalist Megan Norris followed the case for eight years, chronicling Cindy’s heartbreaking journey through a trial, retrial, two failed appeals, and a 2013 High Court ruling that blocked Victorian father Robert Farquharson’s final bid for freedom, putting him behind bars for at least the next thirty-three years.Through exclusive, intimate interviews with Cindy and her family, and a meticulous examination of the overwhelming evidence before the courts, Norris details how two juries concluded Farquharson was guilty of murdering his children. This book offers valuable and first-hand insight into a crime intended to last a lifetime.Told through Cindy’s eyes in the aftermath, ‘On Father’s Day’ is a mother’s legacy to the family she left behind when she passed away in 2022. Updated with an epilogue, her heartbreaking story shows that this is a crime that goes way beyond the grave.‘On Father’s Day’ was written by Megan at Cindy’s request. This book is her voice.Praise for the Book‘A harrowing, deeply compelling narrative that plunges the reader into the dark heart of domestic violence and the unimaginable horror of retaliatory filicide’ Dr. Yvonne Kallane, Ph.D., MA (Human Rights), MAICD, Founder, Change the Ending‘Extraordinary read … powerful insights into the widespread patterns of coercive control and profound impacts of enduring trauma.’ - Sharon Wilkinson - DV Lawyer‘Cindy’s experience and Megan’s thorough research provide a devastating, confronting and utterly compelling read.’ - Dr Deborah Kirkwood, Author of Just Say Goodbye‘The best analysis I’ve read of the ultimate act of family violence… no other journalist and writer has had the involvement in this case like Norris has,’ - Emily Webb, Author and podcaster.
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One Day At A Time
Dear Village One Day At A Time $35.99
One Day At A Time A treasured son. A rare condition. A memoir of loss and joy and everything in between. My mind is racing. I'm trying to make sense of what the doctors have told us, to understand what life is going to look like now, for Levi and for us. We need to tell our families, I think to myself. But Mum is so unwell - how are we going to tell Mum? On a Melbourne afternoon in the eerie early days of the pandemic, young parents Jordan and Gary Ablett finally learned why their beautiful baby boy, Levi, had not been hitting the milestones that most new parents celebrate and are reassured by. After months of concern and worry, the specialists' diagnosis gave them clarity, but with it came an overwhelming sorrow at the loss of the life they had imagined for their son, and for themselves as a family. In One Day at a Time, Jordan bravely shares how she struggled to come to terms with Levi's condition and the new, unexpected path her life had taken raising a child with a disability, while helping to care for her beloved mother as she lived through the final stages of cancer. Raw and honest, this is a story of devastating grief and pain, but it is also the story of how, with the love and unwavering support of her family, and with her faith as her anchor, Jordan and her AFL legend husband found the courage to go on and learned to celebrate every day with Levi as a blessing. It's about finding joy in what you have, even as you mourn what you have lost, and never taking life for granted.
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Out Of The Blue
Dear Village Out Of The Blue $34.99
A frank and open memoir from beloved Blue Wiggle and national treasure Anthony Field.
Outback Astronomer
Dear Village Outback Astronomer $35.99
Outback AstronomerBorn and raised in remote Broken Hill, Trevor Barry left school after year ten to work in the mines. Years later, a single glimpse of Saturn through a colleague's telescope knocked Trevor's world completely off its axis, turning his whole life upside down.With his newfound passion and armed with decades of outback know-how, Trevor set about building an observatory in his backyard using bits and pieces from his shed, a second-hand washing machine motor, rainwater tank parts and an old catamaran wire. It took some canny negotiations with his wife, Cheryl, 'the Gorgeous and Adorable', whose prized garden took a battering - especially when he decided to add a second storey - but before long Trevor was not just gazing at the stars but capturing extraordinary images of the planets.Over the years, Trevor's love affair with Saturn, 'the ringed jewel of the solar system', only grew more passionate, and in his early fifties he did a degree in astronomy, topping his class. When he recorded a massive storm on Saturn from his backyard observatory, he alerted NASA. The world's greatest space agency took note and invited Trevor to contribute to its interplanetary research - leading to opportunities far beyond Broken Hill and even Trevor's wildest dreams.Today, when he's not tending the greens at his local bowls club, Trevor can usually be found in his backyard, collecting data for international research projects. His work is held in high regard by professional astronomers, and his observations are published in peer-reviewed scientific journals around the world.
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Patriot
Penguin Group Patriot $55.00
The powerful and moving memoir of a fearless political opposition leader who paid the ultimate price for his beliefs.<p>'A brave and brilliant book' Guardian'Charisma and courage dazzle on every page' Sunday Times'Patriot will be seen as a historic text' EconomistPatriot is the exhilarating life story of one of the most fearless and inspiring figures of our time, who became a beacon to millions and the sole political threat to Vladimir Putin.This is Alexei Navalny's life in his own words- his Soviet childhood, political awakening, his marriage and beloved family, his total commitment to taking on a corrupt regime and his enduring love of Russia and its people. His 2020 poisoning by the Russian security services was a global news event. In 2024 he died in a brutal Siberian prison. He began writing Patriot whilst recovering from his poisoning; it ends with his prison diaries, seen here for the first time.We witness the growth of his nationwide support. We see his many arrests and harassment and, in stunning detail, the attempt on his life. We understand why he felt he had to return to Russia. In prison, he shows a spirit and a sense of humour that cannot be crushed.Patriot is as dramatic as its author's life - passionate that good and freedom will prevail. It is Alexei Navalny's final letter to the world, a rousing call to continue his work, an unforgettably positive account of a life that will inspire every reader.'A worthy testament to Navalny's courage, defiance and humour' Financial Times'This book is a gospel' Vanity Fair'Inspiring, emboldening - a voice that will not be forgotten' New Yorker**A WATERSTONES BEST BOOK OF 2024**</p>
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Patting The Shark
Dear Village Patting The Shark $34.99
Patting The Shark A surfer's journey learning to live well with cancerTim Baker was living the dream. A best-selling and award-winning surf writer with a beautiful family, a lifetime of exotic travel and a home walking distance to quality waves. That all changed on July 7, 2015, when he was diagnosed, out of the blue, with stage 4, metastatic prostate cancer. So began a descent into the debilitating world of aggressive cancer treatments and a fight for a survival as brutal as any big wave hold down.Tim writes candidly and with a raw vulnerability about this perilous journey through chemotherapy, hormone therapy, radiation and surgery, and his own determined lifestyle strategies to maintain mind, body and spirit. Happily, surfing provided one of his most powerful forms of therapy, and writing about his experiences has proven deeply cathartic. In 2020, 1.5 million men were diagnosed with prostate cancer globally and 375,000 lost their lives. In Australia, one in seven men will develop prostate cancer. Yet mainstream oncology concedes its ability to keep men with prostate cancer alive has outstripped its ability to manage the often-devastating side effects of treatment. Men with prostate cancer are living longer but with a steadily declining quality of life.Patting The Shark documents Tim's efforts to navigate his way through the maze of conventional and supportive therapies - meditation, diet, exercise, emotional support, counselling. Ultimately, it is a desperate plea for a more integrative approach to cancer care, treating the whole person and not just the cancer, allowing cancer patients a sense of empowerment and agency in charting their path through treatment.This is a story about facing your mortality, staring down your fears, and working out what really matters in life, when so many elements of your identity are stripped away. It offers hope, comfort and empathy for anyone facing a cancer diagnosis and their loved ones.