Book picks similar to
Currowan: a Story of Fire and a Community During Australia's Worst Summer by Bronwyn Adcock
non-fiction
australian-authors
environment
extreme_environme<br/>nts
From Snow to Ash: Solitude, soul-searching and survival on Australia's toughest hiking trail
Anthony Sharwood - 2020
Dark Emu
Bruce Pascoe - 2014
The evidence insists that Aboriginal people right across the continent were using domesticated plants, sowing, harvesting, irrigating and storing – behaviours inconsistent with the hunter-gatherer tag. Gerritsen and Gammage in their latest books support this premise but Pascoe takes this further and challenges the hunter-gatherer tag as a convenient lie. Almost all the evidence comes from the records and diaries of the Australian explorers, impeccable sources.
Isn't it well for ye? The Book of Irish Mammies
Colm O'Regan - 2012
She's never short of advice, a kind word and a cup of tea (making sure to scald the teapot first, of course).Bring the coat anyway. If it's too hot you can take it off.Comedian Colm O'Regan explores the phenomenon of the Irish Mammy and what she might say about everything from the 'new mass' to the cardinal sin of not owning a cough bottle and the importance of airing clothes properly. The global influence of the Irish Mammy, through history, science, politics and literature, is undeniable. Did you know, for instance, that Hamlet had an Irish Mammy?So if you're an Irish Mammy, have one, know one or suspect you might be turning into one, this book will act as your guide. But be aware that though this book might think it knows it all, it doesn't, only Mammy knows it all.
Sane: How I shaped up my mind, improved my mental strength and found calm
Emma Young - 2015
Disappointed that her mind does not always deal well with the pressures of modern life, Emma decided to go on mind-toning journey.Is it possible to tone your mind just as you can tone your body so it becomes more resilient and better prepared to deal with what life throws at you?By looking at some of the new and tried and tested techniques, from meditation to mental preparation involved in extreme sports and military training, Emma has devised a programme that will help everyone achieve mental stability.
Together on Top of the World: The Remarkable Story of the First Couple to Climb the Fabled Seven Summits
Phil Ershler - 2007
It is the tale of two people who came together to change each other's lives, about things that should never have happened but did, and about the dreams that come true as a result.
This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. The Climate
Naomi Klein - 2014
It's not about carbon—it's about capitalism. The good news is that we can seize this crisis to transform our failed economic system and build something radically better. In her most provocative book yet, Naomi Klein, author of the global bestsellers Shock Doctrine and No Logo, exposes the myths that are clouding climate debate. You have been told the market will save us, when in fact the addiction to profit and growth is digging us in deeper every day. You have been told it's impossible to get off fossil fuels when in fact we know exactly how to do it—it just requires breaking every rule in the 'free-market' playbook. You have also been told that humanity is too greedy and selfish to rise to this challenge. In fact, all around the world, the fight back is already succeeding in ways both surprising and inspiring. It's about changing the world, before the world changes so drastically that no one is safe. Either we leap—or we sink. This Changes Everything is a book that will redefine our era.
Losing Earth: A Recent History
Nathaniel Rich - 2018
Over the next decade, a handful of scientists, politicians, and strategists, led by two unlikely heroes, risked their careers in a desperate, escalating campaign to convince the world to act before it was too late. Losing Earth is their story, and ours.The New York Times Magazine devoted an entire issue to Nathaniel Rich's groundbreaking chronicle of that decade, which became an instant journalistic phenomenon--the subject of news coverage, editorials, and conversations all over the world. In its emphasis on the lives of the people who grappled with the great existential threat of our age, it made vivid the moral dimensions of our shared plight.Now expanded into book form, Losing Earth tells the human story of climate change in even richer, more intimate terms. It reveals, in previously unreported detail, the birth of climate denialism and the genesis of the fossil fuel industry's coordinated effort to thwart climate policy through misinformation propaganda and political influence. The book carries the story into the present day, wrestling with the long shadow of our past failures and asking crucial questions about how we make sense of our past, our future, and ourselves.Like John Hersey's Hiroshima and Jonathan Schell's The Fate of the Earth, Losing Earth is the rarest of achievements: a riveting work of dramatic history that articulates a moral framework for understanding how we got here, and how we must go forward.
Holding Your Ground: Preparing for Defense if it All Falls Apart
Joe Nobody - 2011
If the government can no longer protect your home, farm or property, HOLDING will teach you how. HOLDING covers virtually every aspect of protecting you and your family in the event society breaks down. Many people have preparations for food, water, shelter and personal defense. HOLDING will teach you how to configure your home, train your team, and properly equip any location for defense. Covering topics ranging from hiding in plain sight to pre-positioning of supplies, HOLDING uses common sense, military tactics and historical examples that allow you to prepare for defense without affecting your property's value or appearance.
The Walkthrough: Insider Tales from a Life in Strategy Guides
Doug Walsh - 2019
For eighteen years, Doug Walsh was one of the most prolific authors of officially licensed video game strategy guides. And now he's ready to talk. One part memoir and one part industry tell-all, The Walkthrough takes players on an entertaining march through gaming’s recent history, from the dawn of the PlayStation to the Xbox 360 and Nintendo Switch. Follow along as Walsh retraces his career and reveals how the books were made, what it was like writing guides to some of the industry’s most celebrated — and derided — titles, and why the biggest publishers of guidebooks are no longer around. Walsh devotes entire chapters to many of gaming’s most popular franchises, including Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, Gears of War, and Diablo, among others. From inauspicious beginnings with Daikatana to authoring the books for the entire Bioshock trilogy, with plenty of highs, lows, and Warp Pipes along the way, Walsh delivers a rare treat to twenty-first century gamers. The Walkthrough is sure to satisfy the curiosity of anyone who grew up with the works of BradyGames and Prima Games sprawled across their laps. With over one hundred books to his credit, and countless weeks spent at many of the most famous studios in North America, he is uniquely qualified to give an insider’s perspective of a little-known niche within the multi-billion-dollar industry.
Ghosts of the Tsunami: Death and Life in Japan’s Disaster Zone
Richard Lloyd Parry - 2017
By the time the sea retreated, more than 18,500 people had been crushed, burned to death, or drowned.It was Japan’s greatest single loss of life since the atomic bombing of Nagasaki. It set off a national crisis, and the meltdown of a nuclear power plant. And even after the immediate emergency had abated, the trauma of the disaster continued to express itself in bizarre and mysterious ways.Richard Lloyd Parry, an award-winning foreign correspondent, lived through the earthquake in Tokyo, and spent six years reporting from the disaster zone. There he encountered stories of ghosts and hauntings. He met a priest who performed exorcisms on people possessed by the spirits of the dead. And he found himself drawn back again and again to a village which had suffered the greatest loss of all, a community tormented by unbearable mysteries of its own.What really happened to the local children as they waited in the school playground in the moments before the tsunami? Why did their teachers not evacuate them to safety? And why was the unbearable truth being so stubbornly covered up?Ghosts of the Tsunami is a classic of literary non-fiction, a heart-breaking and intimate account of an epic tragedy, told through the personal accounts of those who lived through it. It tells the story of how a nation faced a catastrophe, and the bleak struggle to find consolation in the ruins.
Manhunt: The Night Stalker: How I brought serial predator Delroy Grant to justice
Colin Sutton - 2021
High Crimes: the Fate of Everest in an Age of Greed
Michael Kodas - 2008
In the years following the publication of Into Thin Air, much has changed on Mount Everest. Among all the books documenting the glorious adventures in mountains around the world, none details how the recent infusion of wealthy climbers is drawing crime to the highest place on the planet. The change is caused both by a tremendous boom in traffic, and a new class of parasitic and predatory adventurer. It's likely that Jon Krakauer would not recognize the camps that he visited on Mount Everest almost a decade ago. This book takes readers on a harrowing tour of the criminal underworld on the slopes of the world's most majestic mountain.High Crimes describes two major expeditions: the tragic story of Nils Antezana, a climber who died on Everest after he was abandoned by his guide; as well as the author's own story of his participation in the Connecticut Everest Expedition, guided by George Dijmarescu and his wife and climbing partner, Lhakpa Sherpa. Dijmarescu, who at first seemed well-intentioned and charming, turned increasingly hostile to his own wife, as well as to the author and the other women on the team. By the end of the expedition, the three women could not travel unaccompanied in base camp due to the threat of violence. Those that tried to stand against the violence and theft found that the worst of the intimidation had followed them home to Connecticut. Beatings, thefts, drugs, prostitution, coercion, threats, and abandonment on the highest slopes of Everest and other mountains have become the rule rather than the exception. Kodas describes many such experiences, and explores the larger issues these stories raise with thriller-like intensity.
The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival
John Vaillant - 2010
The tiger isn’t just killing people, it’s annihilating them, and a team of men and their dogs must hunt it on foot through the forest in the brutal cold. As the trackers sift through the gruesome remains of the victims, they discover that these attacks aren’t random: the tiger is apparently engaged in a vendetta. Injured, starving, and extremely dangerous, the tiger must be found before it strikes again.As he re-creates these extraordinary events, John Vaillant gives us an unforgettable portrait of this spectacularly beautiful and mysterious region. We meet the native tribes who for centuries have worshipped and lived alongside tigers, even sharing their kills with them. We witness the arrival of Russian settlers in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, soldiers and hunters who greatly diminished the tiger populations. And we come to know their descendants, who, crushed by poverty, have turned to poaching and further upset the natural balance of the region.This ancient, tenuous relationship between man and predator is at the very heart of this remarkable book. Throughout we encounter surprising theories of how humans and tigers may have evolved to coexist, how we may have developed as scavengers rather than hunters, and how early Homo sapiens may have fit seamlessly into the tiger’s ecosystem. Above all, we come to understand the endangered Siberian tiger, a highly intelligent super-predator that can grow to ten feet long, weigh more than six hundred pounds, and range daily over vast territories of forest and mountain.Beautifully written and deeply informative, The Tiger circles around three main characters: Vladimir Markov, a poacher killed by the tiger; Yuri Trush, the lead tracker; and the tiger himself. It is an absolutely gripping tale of man and nature that leads inexorably to a final showdown in a clearing deep in the taiga.
Where the Trees Were
Inga Simpson - 2016
We gathered around the bigger tree. No one asked Matty - he just reached up and put his right hand on the trunk with ours.Kieran cleared his throat. 'We swear, on these trees, to always be friends. To protect each other - and this place.'Finding those carved trees forged a bond between Jay and her four childhood friends and opened their eyes to a wider world. But their attempt to protect the grove ends in disaster, and that one day on the river changes their lives forever.Seventeen years later, Jay finally has her chance to make amends. But at what cost? Not every wrong can be put right, but sometimes looking the other way is no longer an option.
The Happiness Plan
Elise Bialylew - 2018
Drawing on her background in medicine, psychiatry and mindfulness meditation, she has created a powerful one-month mindfulness program that will lead you to a more balanced and fulfilled existence.In this transformative guidebook you’ll discover simple practices to:• Increase your sense of wellbeing, balance and joy• Reduce stress and worry (and its negative impact on your body)• Improve your focus, performance and fulfilment at work• Create more fulfilling relationships• Increase your sense of purpose, connection and meaning in life.Featuring access to guided audio meditations, daily mindfulness exercises, fascinating scientific insights and recipes to inspire mindful eating, The Happiness Plan has the power to transform your mind, and your life.Dr Elise Bialylew is an Australian doctor trained in psychiatry and mindfulness. She is a speaker and founder of Mindful in May, the world’s largest online mindfulness fundraising campaign for global poverty.
