This extraordinary story of courage and faith is based on the actual experiences of three girls who fled from the repressive life of Moore River Native Settlement, following along the rabbit-proof fence back to their homelands. Assimilationist policy dictated that these girls be taken from their kin and their homes in order to be made white. Settlement life was unbearable with its chains and padlocks, barred windows, hard cold beds, and horrible food. Solitary confinement was doled out as regular punishment. The girls were not even allowed to speak their language. Of all the journeys made since white people set foot on Australian soil, the journey made by these girls born of Aboriginal mothers and white fathers speaks something to everyone.

Maria Sirena tells stories. She does it for money—she was a favorite in the cigar factory where she worked as a lettora—and for love, spinning gossamer tales out of her own past for the benefit of friends and family. But now, like a modern-day Scheherazade, she will be asked to tell a story so that eight women can keep both hope and themselves alive. Cuba, 1963. Hurricane Flora, one of the deadliest hurricanes in recorded history, is bearing down on the island. Seven women have been evacuated from their homes and herded into the former governor's mansion, where they are watched over by another woman, a young soldier of Castro's new Cuba named Ofelia. Outside the storm is raging and the floodwaters are rising. In a single room on the top floor of the governor's mansion, Maria Sirena begins to tell the incredible story of her childhood during Cuba's Third War of Independence; of her father Augustin, a ferocious rebel; of her mother, Lulu, an astonishing woman who fought, loved, dreamed, and suffered as fiercely as her husband. Stories, however, have a way of taking on a life of their own, and, swept up by her story's momentum, Maria Sirena will reveal more about herself than she or anyone ever expected. Chantel Acevedo's The Distant Marvels has the epic scope of a contemporary Gone with the Wind and a faith in the power of storytelling equal to Martel's Life of Pi. It is a family saga, a love story, a stunning historical account of the struggle against oppressors, and a long tender plea for forgiveness. The Distant Marvels is, finally, a life-affirming novel about love that lasts a lifetime and the very art of storytelling itself.

Doris Pilkington Garimara was born on traditional birthing ground under the wintamarra tree. Her life in the Mardu camp was disrupted when as a three-year-old she was taken by the authorities to live within the confines of Moore River Native Settlement. Her remarkable story follows on from the courageous journey of her mother Molly Craig, made legendary in the recently released film, 'Rabbit-Proof Fence'.

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The film is based on the true story of three young aboriginal girls (Molly, Gracie and Daisy) forcibly removed from their families in Jigalong, W.A., in 1931. Taken to be trained as domestic servants at Moore River Native Settlement north of Perth, the film tells the story of their experiences to return home along the rabbit-proof fence.

This classic has been released in the Popular Penguin format to mark 50 years of publishing in New Zealand. The format reaches further back to 1935, when Allen Lane founded Penguin Books with a clear vision- 'We believed in the existence of a vast reading public for intelligent books at a low price, and staked everything on it.' Ground-breaking. Original. Heart-rending. Most talked about book in New Zealand, ever. Adapted into a blockbuster movie. Still in print three decades later.

For all the discussion in the media about creationism and 'Intelligent Design', virtually nothing has been said about the evidence in question - the evidence for evolution by natural selection. Yet, as this succinct and important book shows, that evidence is vast, varied, and magnificent, and drawn from many disparate fields of science. The very latest research is uncovering a stream of evidence revealing evolution in action - from the actual observation of a species splitting into two, to new fossil discoveries, to the deciphering of the evidence stored in our genome. Why Evolution is True weaves together the many threads of modern work in genetics, palaeontology, geology, molecular biology, anatomy, and development to demonstrate the 'indelible stamp' of the processes first proposed by Darwin. It is a crisp, lucid, and accessible statement that will leave no one with an open mind in any doubt about the truth of evolution.

A classic work of American literature that has not stopped changing minds and lives since it burst onto the literary scene, The Things They Carried is a ground-breaking meditation on war, memory, imagination, and the redemptive power of storytelling. The Things They Carried depicts the men of Alpha Company: Jimmy Cross, Henry Dobbins, Rat Kiley, Mitchell Sanders, Norman Bowker, Kiowa, and the character Tim O’Brien, who has survived his tour in Vietnam to become a father and writer at the age of forty-three. Taught everywhere—from high school classrooms to graduate seminars in creative writing—it has become required reading for any American and continues to challenge readers in their perceptions of fact and fiction, war and peace, courage and fear and longing. The Things They Carried won France's prestigious Prix du Meilleur Livre Etranger and the Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize; it was also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Charlie Swift just pumped three .38-caliber bullets into a dead polar bear in his taxidermist girlfriend’s garage. But he’s a gun monkey, and no one can blame him for having an itchy trigger finger. Ever since he drove down the Florida Turnpike with a headless body in the trunk of a Chrysler, then took down four cops, Charlie’s been running hard through the sprawling sleaze of central Florida. And to make matters worse, he’s holding on to some crooked paperwork that a lot of people would like to take off his hands. Now, with his boss disappeared and his friends dropping like flies, Charlie has got his work cut out just to survive. If he wants to keep the money and get the girl too, he’s really going to have to go ape... Nominated for the Edgar Award for Best First Novel, Gun Monkeys is a fast, furious collage of wit and wise guys, violence and thrills—and a full-throttle run through the dark side of the Sunshine State.

Ruby Langford Ginibi's bestselling first book is now back in print.With sales of over 30,000 copies since publication in 1988, Don't Take Your Love to Town is now a seminal work of Indigenous memoir. It has been set for HSC over a number of years and is one of the most important Indigenous life stories to be published in Australia.Ruby Langford Ginibi is a remarkable woman whose sense of humour has endured through all the hardships she has experienced. Her first volume of memoir is a story of extraordinary courage in the face of poverty and tragedy. She writes about the changing ways of life in Aboriginal communities - rural and urban; the disintegration of traditional lifestyles and the sustaining energy that has come from the renewal of Aboriginal culture in recent years.As a tribute to her life and work, this rejacketed edition of Don't Take Your Love to Town is being published to coincide with Ruby's new memoir, All My Mob.