Frances M Boyle. 

This is a story of cattle duffing, harassment, arson, corruption and bent police-an engrossing tale of mayhem, villainy and pillage. What is most shocking is that this book is not fiction-What is most shocking about this book is that it is not fiction. It is the story of one family's struggle for survival on a cattle station in far north Queensland. 399pp.

First published in 2003, this edition 2008

Bill Bunbury.

A collection of Australian stories from the popular ABC Radio National historian Bill Bunbury. 

This is a tapestry of snapshots from before European settlement through to the late twentieth century. Stories range from the fascinating account of the 1711 wreck of the Zuytdorp, to an Australian soldier's escape and lone voyage across the Mediterranean in the 1940s. 269pp.

First published in 2006

The early history of northern Australian colonization

At 5400km's it is one of the longest man-made structures. James Woodford follows the fence on a journey through some of the harshest country in the world. 258pp.

First published in 2003, this edition 2011

John D Gardner.

The stories of the men who worked as the dunny man - a history of their lives and the history of the sanitary service they performed. In these days of luxury bathrooms with spa and bidet, it is hard to imagine that just 60 years ago, there was only the outdoor dunny, and the dunny man came along the back lane each night ...160pp.

First published 2009

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A new life under the vast Australian sky 1923. Since Norah's husband was killed in the Great War and she has struggled to provide a home for her daughter. When her father dies her situation becomes even more precarious. Andrew Boyd survived the horrors of the Great War only for his wife to die of influenza shortly after his return. He determines to emigrate and make a new life for his two sons. The Australian government is giving ex-servicemen a farm. But to join the group settlement scheme, Andrew must find a wife. A marriage of convenience suddenly becomes a very real solution to Norah and Andrew's problems. But nothing can prepare them though for the realities of settling in Western Australia. They are not just building a marriage and a family but also a new way of life in one of the wildest countries on earth.

First published in 2008, this edition 2009

′I looked down into where the houses were totally surrounded by a sea of flame and thought, well, that s it, she s all over. Everybody will be killed down there.′ John Hyles, farmer, Namadgi Ranges, ACT.

GREAT AUSTRALIAN BUSHFIRE STORIES is a collection of remarkable stories from all around Australia that tell of our country′s fiercest natural phenomenon: the bushfire.

Farmers, landowners, fire-fighters and city dwellers recount their experiences of fire. Some stories are funny, some tragic and some courageous but all the storytellers exhibit tenacity and grit in their fight to save their homes, their animals, their towns and, in some cases, their lives. 216pp.

First published in 2008

Reprint of the 1930s classic. Ernestine Hill. Her account of a remarkable journey – 100,000 miles across the Australian bush, a woman alone and in 1930. 346pp.  

First published in 1940, this edition 1995

Bill (Swampy) Marsh

A selection of stories from shearers in South Australia, New South Wales and Queensland.

In late 1999, Bill ′Swampy′ Marsh began to collect shearing stories. When he was interviewed by ABC Radio broadcaster Colin Munro on SUMMER ALL OVER, dozens of people phoned in with their own tales. This book is a collection of those yarns.

The world of shearing is filled with outback stations, larrikins, roustabouts, sagacious dogs and babbling brooks whose blood is worth bottling. 278pp.

First published in 2001, this edition 2007

In the 1800s, the first white farmers and graziers making their homes in the outback were joined by their wives, many of whom had no idea what lay in store.

Expecting a tropical paradise, these female pioneers encountered instead conditions which would test, and often defeat them; relentless heat and dust, isolation, hostile wildlife, the threat of rape and violence, no medical facilities and neverending, backbreaking work.

The outback was, according to the mantra of the day, ′no place for a lady′, and yet many women with no previous experience of hardship rose to the challenge, turning their skills to creating homes, nursing, farming, grazing - and recording their endeavours in diaries, which today provide a startling picture of the hurdles they faced.

Great Pioneer Women of the Outback profiles Australia′s women pioneers, from Jeannie Gunn, author of We of the Never Never, to lesser known figures like Atlanta Bradshaw and Evelyn Maunsell. Building on her knowledge of Australian women′s history, Susanna de Vries′s book records the extraordinary grit and determination it took to build what many today would consider an ordinary life. 302pp.

First published in 2005