Recent biographies

"From a young age, food was Sumayya's portal to nurturing, love and self-expression. She spent the first eight years of her life at sea, with a father who captained merchant ships and a mother who preferred to cook for the family herself on a tiny electric stove in their cabin rather than eat in ...

What happens when you take your 85-year-old mother to live with you on a Greek island? In life, as in myth, women are the ones who are supposed to stay home like Penelope, weaving at their looms, rather than leaving home like Odysseus. Meet eighty-five-year-old Barbara and her sixty-two-year-old ...

"All Anthony Callea wanted was to sing. From his first memories of singing for his family, Anthony knew that he wanted to share his voice with the world. He had a strongly held dream but was as surprised as anyone when his breakout moment (his heart-stopping rendition of 'The Prayer' on Australia...

I lost my possessions, my salary, my status, my career, my country. And in that fall, I gained everything. Bhutan is known as the land of Gross National Happiness, a Buddhist Shangri-la hidden in the Himalayas. But in the late 1980s, Bhutan waged a brutal ethnic-cleansing campaign against its cit...

The British monarchy is at a turning point. Concise and engaging, this book charts the very beginnings of British reign through to the longest serving monarch, Queen Elizabeth II - and looks forward to the reign of King Charles III. Much more than a linear history, this is the intertwined story o...

Born in 1947 in Ireland, Sam Neill emigrated to New Zealand at the age of seven. Young Sam discovered he was hopeless at sport, but loved acting. In 1977 he played the lead in the pioneering New Zealand film Sleeping Dogs, a performance that led to a major role in Gillian Armstrong's celebrated M...

"The remarkable story of the intrepid French archaeologist who led the international effort to save ancient Egyptian temples from the floodwaters of the Aswan Dam, by the New York Times bestselling author of Madame Fourcade's Secret War In the 1960s, the world's attention was focused on a nail-b...

Jana writes just as she speaks: with honesty, conviction and humour, making her path to self-acceptance relatable for all of us. It took oodles of self-reflection before I came to realise my quirks developed into my resilience, my emotion gave me my empathy and my drama fuelled my passion. Too of...

Nelson Mandela wanted freedom for black people from apartheid in South Africa. He fought hard for freedom and equality and became the first black president of South Africa.

Steve Jobs was a brilliant inventor and businessman. His computers, tablets and iPods have changed our lives and work. Steve was sometimes very difficult to work with, but he was also special. He thought about the world in a different way, and he had many brilliant ideas.

A middle grade graphic memoir based on author Dan Santat's awkward middle school years and the trip to Europe that changed his life. Dan's always been a good kid. The kind of kid who listens to his teachers, helps his mom with grocery shopping, and stays out of trouble. But being a good kid doesn...

"Nurse and midwife Prue Wheelwright has worked in the most remote parts of Australia and around the world. In isolated, far-flung locations and on dangerous frontlines, this passionate and dedicated nurse has put her heart, and often her safety, on the line, day after day, year after year. Prue s...

Born on the tiny island on Zanzibar off the coast of modern-day Tanzania, young Farrokh dreamt of having a fabulous life. When his parents sent him to boarding school in India, he discovered his true talent for singing, as well as a love of playing rock 'n' roll songs on the piano. By the time he...

Sita Walker was raised by five strong matriarchs who taught her to believe in God and to be good. Her grandmother, mother and three aunts believed in unshakeable faith, in the power of prayer, in sacrifice, in magic, in the healing of turmeric and tea, and the wisdom of dreams. But as hard as she...

If you haven't seen a Discovery Channel gold-hunting show, you might picture a gold prospector as a relic of the Wild West: a TNT-toting, bearded old man wildly swinging a pick on the hunt for nuggets, guided by old maps, superstition, legends and instinct. It's still predominantly a man's world,...

"I imagined lounging on a veranda overlooking folds of hills striped with vines. I'd be clothed in linen and surrounded by friends. On the table would be tumblers of wine we'd picked in last year's harvest. Then we arrived at Cockatoo Hill and discovered a dump..." When Deirdre and her husband Ro...

In this heartfelt memoir of food, love and self-discovery, Charlotte Ree takes us along her journey of learning to cook in the wake of a divorce that left her feeling unsure of who she was and what she wanted at a time when the whole world was turned upside down. With each meal that she masters--...

Discover the life of Hedy Lamarr, the actress and inventor whose curiosity broke boundaries. Young Hedy Lamarr was fascinated with machines. At 5 years old, she would take apart her music box and put it back together to see how it worked. A gifted musician and actress, she soon found fame on the ...

A collection of deeply personal conversations from award-winning actress and activist Laura Dern and the woman she admires most, her mother-legendary actress Diane Ladd. What happens when we are brave enough to speak our truths to the ones we love the most? Laura Dern and Diane Ladd always had a ...