This book is a revised and edited version of the original Book “A Dimdim in Paradise” published by Balboa Press in 2014. I went to Papua New Guinea with Mining Giant Conzinc Rio Tinto in 1970 to work in their Bougainville Mine and fell hopelessly in love with the country, and it’s people. This book follows my journey through the thirty-six years I lived in-country, teaching in an agricultural college, vocational training centres and the fisheries college. I attended six-to-six dances deep in the jungle, hid under a table in a tavern that was attacked by warring tribesmen during a tribal fight. I helped remove the Apartheid system, and lived for weeks at a time in the villages of the idyllic Duke of York islands.

Captain Jin Li is a Chinese Special Forces Soldier who is part of a Chinese Invasion force that moves into Cairns on the tail of Cyclone Karen. The Australian Prime Minister is on holiday in Hawaii and no-one else notices that the Country has been invaded. Communications are down and the roads blocked by floods. Captain Jin befriends Andy and his son Jude in Cairns. When the Chinese decide to pull out, Australia is still blissfully unaware that they have been invaded. Captain Jin decides to defect, and stay in Australia, so he asks Andy, Jude, and local First Nations boy Jason for help. They head for Darwin in Andy’s car, closely followed by a Chinese Hit Squad. Papua New Guinea boys Tibu, and his Sniper Pal Tibu travel through time from WW2 Rabaul to bring Captain Li’s Parents out of China. They are joined by two Thai Monks, all of whom have to deal with Chinese Hit Squads wherever they go. Which includes the Adelaide Hills.

This is an ethnography of Dobu, a Massim society of Papua New Guinea, which has been renowned in social anthropology since Reo Fortune's Sorcerers of Dobu (1932). Focusing on exchange and its underlying ethics, this book explores the concept of the person in the Dobu world view. The book examines major aspects of exchange such as labor, mutual support, apologetic gifts, revenge and punishment, kula exchange, and mortuary gifts. It discusses in detail the characteristics of small gifts (such as betel nuts), big gifts (kula valuables, pigs, and large yams) and money as they appear in exchange contexts. The ethnography begins with an analysis of the construct of the Dobu person, and sets out to examine everyday practices and values. The belief system (incorporating witches, sorcerers, and a Christian God) is shown to have a powerful influence on individual conduct due to its panoptic character. The institutions that link Dobu with the outside world are examined in terms of the ideology concerning money: the Church receives offerings for God; the difficulties faced by trade-store owners evince conflicting notions concerning monetary wealth. The last two chapters delve into lived experience in two major domains of Dobu exchange: kula and the sagali feast.

This book is the third Tibu & Tovaira Novel, and is set in South Australia, and Papua New Guinea. It begins in the early sixties semi-rural Belair South Australia where some of the neighborhood boys overhear a Russian message on a crystal radio set. This triggers a series of events which has the boys hiding two Russian Defectors from the KGB. Ramale Sorcerer Tomarum has a vision of one of the Australian boys being shot by the Russians, so sends Tibu & Tovaira travelling through time from 1942 War torn Rabaul to the Coorong in South Australia. The book draws once again on the wonderful Tolai Culture of East New Britain. Sorcery and a secret Men's Society. The book also sees Tibu & Tovaira heading off to Tol to investigate reports of a massacre by the invading Japanese in 1942.