Jackaroo   Michael Thornton

In 1967, fresh from boarding school humiliations, and having lost his father to alcoholism, gangly teen Michael Thornton was packed off to a tough sheep and cattle station to work as a jackaroo. He was to learn the wool trade from the lamb up, under a boss legendary for working his farmhands in an almost military regimen.

Tasked with the dirty, disgusting and downright dangerous jobs, jackaroos are the dogsbodies of our farms. But at Habbies Howe, in central Victoria, somewhere between castrating lambs with his teeth and hauling backbreaking sacks of fertiliser for no obvious purpose, Michael discovered inner strength, and the friendship and male role models he'd craved.

He also earned respect – enough to later walk into a job with the nation's most famous farmer, the Defence Minister and future PM Malcolm Fraser.

In Jackaroo, Thornton recalls his years learning the ropes in an era when farm work was still done on horseback. Engaging, candid and often funny, his memoir reveals the hard working lives of the unsung all-rounders of the country.  

First published 2011

Jill Bowen.         

As a barely literate youth of fifteen, Sidney Kidman ran away from home and worked as an odd-job boy in a grog shanty in outback Australia. He went on to become the greatest pastoral landholder in modern history, acquiring a legendary reputation both at home and abroad as the Cattle King.

As an biographer Jill bowen shows, Kidman was much more than a grazier. In addition to his many successful business ventures and his contributions to the war effort, he has driven by a grand plan for the remote, arid areas of Australia. This kept locked in a battle with the land – and against drought. 520pp. 

First published in 1987, this edition 2007

Mary Durack

The best saga of pastoral Australia ever published... hard to describe without superlatives... in a hundred years the book will still be a classic.'

'... far better than any novel; an incomparable record of a greart family and of a series of great actions.' The Bulletin

When Patrick Durack left Western Ireland for Australia in 1853, he was to found a pioneering dynasty and build a cattle empire across the great stretches of Australia.
With a profound sense of family history, his grand-daughter, Mary Durack reconstructed the Durack saga - a story of intrepid men and ground-breaking adventure.
This sweeping tale of Australia and Australians remains a classic nearly fifty years on.

First published 1959, this edition 2000

King of The Outback Tales from an off-road advernturer

Bill King is the pioneer who put the Australian outback on the map for both local and international tourists. Through an enterprise founded on hope and grit-now operating as AAT Kings-he opened up a completely new branch of Australian tourism. Thousands of Australians have experienced the adventure of a lifetime in Bill's capable hands, often walking in the footsteps of explorers such as Burke and Wills, Leichhardt, Sturt and Stuart.Eccentric drivers, mad passengers and sticky situations abound against the backdrop of the glorious Australian outback. Bill and his tour groups sometimes got lost, bogged or stranded-sometimes even scared out of their wits-but there was always a fierce determination to bring the show back home. Bill never lost a passenger or brought one to harm, though by heck they did sometimes try his monumental patience.  

First published 2011

Temporarily unavailable

Pat Studdy-Clift. 

The full story of Elizabeth Jessie Hickman’s  circus career, cattle duffing, escape from the police and final taming. 226pp. 

First published 1996

Left For Dead: How I Survived 71 Days Lost in a Desert Hell

Ricky Megee.

In April 2006 the news broke of an amazing feat of survival by a white man in one of the most inhospitable areas of Australia. Ricky Megee was found sheltering by a dam on a remote cattle property in the Northern Territory.
After being abducted on the Buntine Highway then left for dead, Ricky had walked for ten days in bare feet through unforgiving terrain in blistering heat. Stumbling upon a dam, he set up camp there and survived for almost three months on leeches, grasshoppers, frogs and plants, losing 60 kilograms in the process.

First published 2008, this edition 2010

Miriam Estensen. 

A story of persistence, risk taking, driving ambition and frustration. A richly detailed account of tragedy and short lived triumph.

First published 2002, this edition 2003

Life Without Limits is the story of gutsy Nick Vujicic, an amazing 28-year-old Aussie born without arms or legs who is now an internationally successful inspirational speaker. Packed full of wisdom, testimonials of his faith and laugh-out-loud humour, Nick tells of life in his 'Chesty Bond' body, his visit to Africa at the age of 20 where he gave away $20,000 of his life savings to the poor, and raised another $20,000 for them on the side, and how he learned to surf, skateboard, dive and more.
Noting that 'perfection isn't always perfect' and that 'brokenness can be a good thing', Nick shows how he learned to accept what he could not control and focus instead on what he could. He encourages everyone to find their life's purpose and, whatever their obstacles, go for it. He's already appeared in an acclaimed short film doing his own stunts, and his zest for life is unbelievably infectious.

First published 2010, this edition 2011