Written for Americans, but equally amusing to anyone visiting the shores of the Great Southern Land, this book examines the relationship between Australia and the U.S., including how Australians view their American cousins. The author has plenty of experience of working and dealing with Americans. He is married to an American nurse and has lived his life within the massive cultural influence that America has shared with Australia since the Second World War. The author’s stories are brimming with empathy and jokes for his American audience. The book is written from the opinion of an Aussie Bloke and the easy-to-digest chapters are just long enough to leave the reader smiling and well informed.Topics include Blokes and Sheilas, Bloody Foster’s, Dangerous Creatures, Talking to Dogs, The GAFA, Speaking Strail-yun and Working for the Queen. Confused? You won’t be after reading this book!

    On September 5, 1856, a submerged walnut tree pierced her hull, sinking the Arabia one-half mile below Parkville, Missouri. In time the river changed course, leaving the Arabia and her priceless freight deep beneath a Kansas farm field...The Arabia and her treasure seemed lost forever. Then, in 1988, four men and their families dedicated themselves to achieve what others could not; to recover the treasure from the Great White Arabia. Treasure hunter Greg Hawley chronicles his amazing story of perseverance and discovery. Lavishly illustrated and carefully documented, this book is a page turning adventure that immerses the reader into the thrilling discovery of buried treasure.

    See the books that made APJ Abdul Kalam

    What could possibly go wrong? “What was I thinking? In that moment of madness, I completely forgot that I’m a total wuss, terrified of heights. In my defense, it doesn’t come up much in my city life, although I do need to practice meditative deep breathing on freeway overpasses….” So swept along by the enthusiasm of her usually very predictable husband, a newly retired engineer, Laurel agrees to leave her overly busy life behind, let go of her worries about her grown children, and spend two months hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. She hopes the shared adventure will bring added intimacy to her odd-couple marriage and that time in nature will support her spiritual growth, or at least help her talk some sense into her rampaging inner critic. Despite paralyzing fear, sickness, injury, and hail, the majestic grandeur of the High Sierra did work some kind of miracle. “I picked up Waking up in a Tent, planning to spend a few minutes looking it over. Before I knew it, two hours had flown by and I was halfway through the book. Much of the book’s charm comes from Laurel’s determination to bring a spiritual perspective to hardships on the trail and friction with her husband. It’s not only a great read, but an education in how to maintain a rewarding marriage.” Carolyn Godschild Miller, Ph.D. author of Creating Miracles, A Practical Guide to Divine Intervention “I’ve never been backpacking, but I felt I was there on the trail with Laurel and John, marveling at the beauty around me. Although Laurel struggles, she never takes herself too seriously, and that’s where the humor comes in. I laughed out loud at the depictions of her inner dialogue.” Joan Bell

    A Ranger's Guide to Yellowstone Day Hikes features 29 day hikes of different lengths and levels of difficulty. Each hike in the book has a GPS-compatible map, color photograph, narrative about natural and human history, botany, geology, and other highlights along the trail. Visit FarcountryPress.com for more information.

    Now the greatest angling explorer of his generation (Independent on Sunday) returns to delight readers with a book of an entirely different sort, the book he was always destined to write--the distillation of a life spent fishing. Thoughtful and funny, brimming with wisdom and above all, adventure, these are pitch-perfect reflections that anyone who has ever fished will identify with, for ultimately it touches on what fishing teaches us all about life.

    A box set consisting of three Bill Bryson books, 'Notes from a Small Island', 'Notes from a Big Country' and 'A Walk in the Woods'.

    If you’re looking for the outer orbits of America, come to Florida, and if you seek the Sunshine State’s funky-drumbeat fringe, you can do no better than Lynn Waddell.”—Tim Dorsey, New York Times best-selling author “Waddell takes readers to Florida’s wild side, where strippers, swingers, bikers, exotic animals, and carnies enjoy sun-kissed lives in America’s strangest state.”?Trevor Aaronson, author of The Terror Factory: Inside the FBI’s Manufactured War on Terrorism “Lynn Waddell’s riveting you-are-there reporting lives at the intersection where Florida’s wacky subcultures and seamy undersides meet up. When you read this book, make sure you’re standing over carpet—that way you won’t hurt your jaw from dropping it so many times.”—Craig Pittman, author of The Scent of Scandal: Greed, Betrayal, and the World’s Most Beautiful Orchid “A fast, fascinating read. Waddell delivers ten surprising subcultures you might not dare visit on your own.”?Lyn Millner, Florida Gulf Coast UniversityFlorida has a titillating underbelly that few tourists ever see. Beyond the theme parks and the beaches lies a periphery most residents know about but—out of decorum or discomfort?prefer not to discuss. In Fringe Florida, Lynn Waddell explores the exotic, sensational, and sometimes illicit worlds of the oddest state in the nation.Waddell takes the reader on a colorful journey to meet the most unconventional of Floridians in unbelievable and spectacular places. At Fetish Con, she befriends furries and pony girls. She travels to Cassadaga, the oldest active Spiritualist community in the South, where trained mediums converse with the dead, and to the Holy Land Experience theme park in Orlando, where one can eat a hot dog while watching a reenactment of the Crucifixion. She interviews the founder of the Leather & Lace Motorcycle Club, a Daytona Beach-area grandmother who hosts the club’s annual gathering, welcoming scores of lady bikers to camp out on the lawn of her subdivision home. At an Animal Amnesty Day outside Busch Gardens, Waddell meets exotic reptile owners who give up their beloved-but no-longer-manageable pets and others who vie to take home the cast-offs.If you’ve ever wanted to parade around on a pimped-out swamp buggy amidst a couple thousand beer-swigging mud boggers or fall asleep with a python hissing in your ear, been tempted to bring a Capuchin monkey in a stroller to a Little League game, or contemplated sitting on the beach waiting to be picked up by a UFO but couldn’t quite bring yourself to such extremes, Fringe Florida is for you.

    Four Thousand Dogs.An incredible true story of rescue and redemption. When Keith Benning accepted the job as a deputy in a small North Dakota county, he had no idea he was about to face the biggest challenge of his life. Four years and four thousand dogs later, he lost his marriage, a fellow officer and nearly his own life. By rescuing seventy starving and unwanted animals out of his garage each month, Keith and a small team of volunteers have changed the world for thousands of dogs, and tens of thousands more to come. Woven with riveting and inspiring real-life rescue stories, Rescue Matters tells a larger tale of tragedy-meets-redemption. A gripping account of how a garage rescue grew into a mighty force that inspired a nation.C.J. English shares her personal experience inside the emotional and bittersweet world of dog rescue, delivering a heart-wrenching and deeply moving story that has much to teach us about responsibility and compassion. Rescue Matters is alive with meaning and purpose, proving that that it doesn’t take a law or government to change the world, all it takes is a few people trying to make a difference to start a revolution. Not just for dog lovers, but for anyone inspired by the compassion of humans and the resilience of the animals who forgive them. 50% of the profits from the sale of this book will go directly back to Keith Benning and his team at Turtle Mountain Animal Rescue.

    In captivating and elegant prose, Abbs follows in the footsteps of women who boldly reclaimed wild landscapes for themselves, including Georgia O’Keeffe in the empty plains of Texas and New Mexico, Nan Shepherd in the mountains of Scotland, Gwen John following the French River Garonne, Daphne du Maurier along the River Rhône, and Simone de Beauvoir—who walked as much as twenty-five miles a day in a dress and espadrilles—through the mountains and forests of France.Part historical inquiry and part memoir, the stories of these writers and artists are laced together by moments in Abb’s own life, beginning with her poet father who raised her in the Welsh countryside as an “experiment,” according to the principles of Rousseau. Abbs explores a forgotten legacy of moving on foot and discovers how it has helped women throughout history to find their voices, to reimagine their lives, and to break free from convention.As Abbs traces the paths of exceptional women, she realizes that she, too, is walking away from her past and into a radically different future. Windswept crosses continents and centuries in a provocative and poignant account of the power of walking in nature.

    And to do this wholeheartedly, energetically and joyfully.’ Finally! A book about saving our planet that is fast, funny and inspiring too. Isabel doesn’t bother with an examination of the problem but gets right on with the solutions. Her aim: to look for every single way that we can take care of the planet; how we live and work, travel, shop, eat, drink, dress, vote, play, volunteer, bank – everything. The feel-good book of the year for anyone who loves nature and knows that one person can make a HUGE difference. ‘This is the joy we need in our lives.’ - George Monbiot ‘She gave my spirit a lift and my feet somewhere to stand.’ - Sir Mark Rylance ‘Practical and realistic as well as visionary.’ - Dr Rowan Williams ‘A manifesto of brilliant advice offered with humility and good grace. A practical guide to empower us all.’ - Isabella Tree ISABEL LOSADA is the bestselling author of six previous books including The Battersea Park Road to Enlightenment.

    They drive for hours from all across Texas and beyond, sometimes for just a short weekend of wilderness. They bring everything needed for camping, boating, hiking, birding, and backpacking stuffed into or strapped to their vehicles. Most importantly, this loyal group of visitors brings a strong sense of caring and respect for the park.Most visitors to Big Bend National Park enjoy a wonderful, incident-free vacation and return home with great photos, thrilling memories, and stories of excitement and adventure. But accidents, even catastrophes, can happen. For a rare few Park visitors, a simple mistake, a lack of adequate preparation, or just plain hard luck has lead to deadly or near deadly outcomes. Heat stroke, dehydration, hypothermia, drowning, falls, lightning, and even murder have claimed victims at Big Bend. This book chronicles selected serious injuries, dramatic rescues, and tragic fatalities that have occurred in the Park since the early 1980s.Death In Big Bend contains useful information that could one day save your life.

    Kathleen Jamie, award winning poet, has an eye and an ease with the nature and landscapes of Scotland as well as an incisive sense of our domestic realities. In Findings she draws together these themes to describe travels like no other contemporary writer. Whether she is following the call of a peregrine in the hills above her home in Fife, sailing into a dark winter solstice on the Orkney islands, or pacing around the carcass of a whale on a rain-swept Hebridean beach, she creates a subtle and modern narrative, peculiarly alive to her connections and surroundings.

    Their experience included reading a few books, watching a couple of instructional videos, and sailing once a week for a year. They were land-lubberly, middle-class twentysomethings, audacious and in love. All they wanted was to be together and do something extraordinary. They quit their jobs, bought a boat that was categorically considered "too small" for ocean sailing, and left Portland, Oregon for the Sea of Cortez.The Box Wine Sailors tells the true story of a couple's ramshackle trip down the coast, with all the exulting highs and terrifying lows of sailing a small boat on the Pacific. From nearly being rammed by a pair of whales on Thanksgiving morning and the terrifying experience of rounding Punta Gorda—hanging on to the mast for dear life and looking about at what seemed like the apocalypse—to having their tiller snap off while accidentally surfing coastal breakers and finding ultimate joy in a $5 Little Caesar's pizza. It also tells the story of two very normal people doing what most people only dream of, settling the argument that if you want something bad enough you can make it happen.

    Written with honesty and humour, this factual book shows how the Charltons shook their family tree until a Regency convict fell out.'Seeking Our Eagle' takes us on a fascinating journey back through three hundred years and the turbulent lives of seven generations of their family. Illustrated with poignant photographs, it shows how the Charltons first became interested in genealogy and gradually uncovered their history. The author reveals how she eventually stumbled across the Northumbrian skeleton in their closet, researched his sorry tale of injustice and turned it into a novel. Illuminating the importance of family in all our lives, 'Seeking our Eagle' is an entertaining and informative read for anyone interested in genealogical research or social history, and for those writing historical fiction.