ADVENTURE AROUND THE WORLD
Australia   |   READING AND TRAVEL GUIDE
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Fodor's Exploring Australia  •  Michael Ivory
GUIDEBOOK •  2007 •  PAPER  • 288 PAGES
This excellent, up-to-date guide will take you Down Under with ease -- and style. With maps, illustrations and unusually solid information on features of cultural, historical and natural interest. (AUS29, $22.00)
  Fodor's Exploring Australia
The Songlines  •  Bruce Chatwin
CULTURAL PORTRAIT •  1988 •  PAPER  • 294 PAGES • FAVORITE
This celebrated travelogue is as much about its gifted author -- and the meaning of travel -- as about the Aboriginal people and their ways of life. In this unusual book, Chatwin combines straightforward reporting, history, dream-time stories, and a heady mix of quotations from his notebooks. Along the way, he transforms a journey through the outback into an exhilarating, semi-fictional meditation on our place in the world. (AUS01, $16.00)
  The Songlines
Australia: The East, Travellers' Wildlife Guides  •  Les Beletsky
FIELD GUIDE •  2007 •  PAPER  • 544 PAGES
A wonderfully comprehensive guide to the plant and animal life of eastern Australia. The colorful book features illustrations of 650 commonly encountered fish, reptiles, amphibians, mammals and birds and special sections on the Great Barrier Reef and eastern Australian and Tasmanian wildlife parks and reserves. (AUS167, $29.95)
  Australia: The East, Travellers' Wildlife Guides
In a Sunburned Country  •  Bill Bryson
TRAVEL NARRATIVE •  2001 •  PAPER  • 307 PAGES • FAVORITE
Nothing seems to deter the intrepid, ever-resourceful Bill Bryson -- and all the better for his many readers. Here he revels in Australia's eccentric characters, dangerous flora and fauna, and other oddities. As has become his custom, he also effortlessly imparts much history in this wildly funny book. Included at the end is a short bibliography. (AUS83, $14.95)
  In a Sunburned Country
Australia Map  •   HEMA Maps
2007 •  MAP
A large folded map of Australia, at an scale of 1:4,500,000. National parks, reserves and roads are all clearly marked. The reverse side features insets of major city centers and regions, including Sydney, Perth, Darwin and Hobart. Two Sides. 34x40 inches. (AUS23, $10.95)
  Australia Map
 

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Australia, An Ecotraveler's Guide  •  Hannah Robinson   • GUIDEBOOK  •  A handbook and guide to wildlife, habitats and travel in Australia with 400 color photographs and excellent descriptive information on birds, mammals and other creatures. (AUS128, $23.95)
 
 
Culture Smart! Australia  •  Barry Penney   • GUIDEBOOK  •  A concise, no-nonsense guide to local customs, etiquette and culture with a short overview of the land and people along with practical travel advice. (AUS189, $13.35)
 
 
Eyewitness Guide Sydney  •   Eyewitness Guides   • GUIDEBOOK  •  This superb guide to Sydney features color photography, dozens of excellent neighborhood maps and a district-by-district synopsis of the city's attractions. (AUS25, $23.00)
 
 
Fodor's Sydney's 25 Best  •   Fodor's   • GUIDEBOOK  •  A shirt-pocket guide and map. (AUS166, $11.95)
 
 
A Commonwealth of Thieves, The Improbable Birth of Australia  •  Thomas Keneally   • HISTORY  •  Keneally illuminates the birth of New South Wales with drama and flair, richly evoking the social conditions in London, long sea voyage and the conditions in Australia. (AUS177, $16.00)
 
 
Australia Revealed  •   Discovery Channel   • CULTURAL PORTRAIT  •  Head Down Under and explore the wonders of Australia in this Discovery Atlas presentation. (AUS231, $14.98)
 
 
Australia, A New History of the Great Southern Land  •  Frank Welsh   • HISTORY  •  In this authoritative, balanced history Frank Welsh focuses on the political development of Australia from the European discovery of the continent through the period of colonization. (AUS165, $37.50)
 
 
The Fatal Shore  •  Robert Hughes   • HISTORY • FAVORITE  •  In this celebrated social history, both scholarly and entertaining, Hughes traces the fate of those who were transported to the penal colonies of Australia between 1787 and 1868. It's an engaging popular account, drawn from the experiences of the colonists themselves. (AUS04, $19.95)
 
 
Aboriginal Art  •  Wally Caruana   • ART & ARCHITECTURE  •  This well illustrated survey focuses on the spiritual and geographic sources of art and ritual traditions in Australia. With 187 well produced black-and-white and color illustrations. (AUS14, $14.95)
 
 
Rough Guide Australian Aboriginal Music  •   Various Artists   • MUSIC  •  A carefully chosen sampling of the diverse sounds of the Australian Aborigines, drawing on 50,000 years of culture and history. (AUS182, $14.98)
 
 
Daisy Bates in the Desert: A Woman's Life Among the Aborigines  •  Julia Blackburn   • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR  •  In this wonderfully original biography, Blackburn recreates the life of Daisy Bates (1861-1951), who abandoned her comfortable surroundings in 1913 to live for 30 years in the wilderness. It opens memorably "There was once a woman who lived in the desert." (AUS37, $13.00)
 
 
My Place  •  Sally Morgan   • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR • HARD TO FIND ELSEWHERE  •  A deeply moving autobiography of three generations in Australia, which artfully evokes aboriginal culture. Morgan, who spent her childhood in Perth, didn't discover her Aboriginal background until she was in her teens. (AUS19, $19.95)
 
 
One For the Road, An Outback Adventure  •  Tony Horwitz   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  A classic travel adventure by favorite author Tony Horwitz. This time he's set loose among the Aborigines, exiled desert rats and other odd characters in the outback. (AUS79, $14.00)
 
 
The Road from Coorain  •  Jill Ker Conway   • BIOGRAPHY/MEMOIR  •  An absorbing account of a young rural girl's coming of age in post-war Sydney. Conway paints a vivid picture of isolation and beauty -- and of the challenges of a bright, ambitious woman growing up Australian. (AUS03, $13.95)
 
 
The Singing Line, Tracking the Australian Adventures of My Intrepid Victorian Ancestors  •  Alice Thomson   • TRAVEL NARRATIVE  •  The story of Charles and Alice Todd, who left Victorian England for South Australia as told by their great-great-granddaughter. (AUS88, $19.00)
 
 
Tracks, A Woman's Solo Trek Across 1700 Miles of Australian Outback  •  Robyn Davidson   • EXPLORATION  •  The true-life story of a woman's trek across the Australian outback -- an adventurous tale shot through with a feel for the landscape and empathy for the Aborigines she meets along the way. (AUS15, $14.95)
 
 
Australia, A Traveler's Literary Companion  •  Robert Ross   • ANTHOLOGY  •  Arranged geographically, this collection of works by mostly local writers, including Patrick White, Peter Carey and other luminaries introduces the cultures, geography and mindset of Australia. (AUS38, $13.95)
 
 
A Town Like Alice  •  Neville Shute   • LITERATURE  •  A powerful novel of triumph and war-time courage. (AUS72, $15.00)
 
 
Mr. Darwin's Shooter  •  Roger McDonald   • LITERATURE  •  A New York Times Notable Book from one of Australia's most acclaimed authors, this novel presents the dilemma of Syms Covington, who assists aboard the HMS Beagle as a youth but later must grapple with the worldwide moral crises resulting from Darwin's claims. (AUS201, $14.00)
 
 
The Bone is Pointed  •  Arthur Upfield   • MYSTERY  •  This Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte mystery finds the half-Aborigine detective in the place he knows best, the Australian outback, where he is investigating the disappearance of a local scoundrel. (AUS171, $20.95)
 
 
The Nutmeg of Consolation  •  Patrick O'Brian   • LITERATURE  •  This 14th installment in the Aubrey/Maturin series finds Captain Aubrey and his crew shipwrecked and making their way to the penal colony at Botany Bay, the notorious first European settlement in Australia. (AUS17, $14.99)
 
 
The Secret River  •  Kate Grenville   • LITERATURE  •  Inspired by the history of her own family, Kate Grenville evokes all the bravado, trickery and conflict over the settlement of New South Wales in her tale of a Thames boatsman banished to the new colony in 1806 (AUS179, $14.00)
 
 
The Thorn Birds  •  Colleen McCullough   • LITERATURE  •  This best-selling classic about life in the Australian Outback spans three generations, detailing all of the tragedies and dramas that the resilient members of the Cleary fam-ily face. (AUS66, $7.99)
 
 
The Turning, New Stories  •  Tim Winton   • LITERATURE  •  These 17 overlapping stories, steeped in everyday life on western Australia, follow the fates of a handful of characters in a small coastal town outside Perth. Winton, short-listed twice so far for the Booker Prize, has published a string of memorable novels, children's books and stories, all richly set in the working class milieu of the sparsely populated coastal desert. (AUS169, $15.00)
 
 
True History of the Kelly Gang  •  Peter Carey   • LITERATURE  •  Outlaw, folk hero, thief and patriot, the Irish immigrant Ned Kelly and his clan figure large in the Australian mindset. (AUS119, $14.95)
 
 
Voss  •  Patrick White   • LITERATURE  •  White's 1957 epic, based upon the extravagant life and exploits of the 19th-century Prussian explorer and naturalist Ludwig Leichhardt, who disappeared on an expedition into the Australian outback. (AUS210, $16.00)
 
 
Australia, Land Beyond Time  •   IMAX   • NATURAL HISTORY  •  A dazzling overview of Australia, its geology, evolution, culture and wildlife on DVD, originally presented in IMAX theatres. (AUS168, $14.99)
 
 
Chasing Kangaroos: A Continent, a Scientist, and a Search for the World's Most Extraordinary Creature  •  Tim Flannery   • NATURAL HISTORY  •  Flannery weaves his own coming-of-age as a scientist with tales of the strange marsupial, past and present, in this ode to the Kangaroo. (AUS186, $14.00)
 
 
Penguins  •  Lloyd Spencer David  •  Martin Renner   • NATURAL HISTORY  •  A concise, comprehensive overview of the penguins, their evolution, ecology and behavior. (ANT207, $45.00)
 
 
The Snorkeller's Guide to the Coral Reef, From the Red Sea to the Pacific Ocean  •  Paddy Ryan  •  Peter Atkinson   • NATURAL HISTORY  •  The best-selling, take-along guide to coral reefs, coral reef fishes, invertebrates and plants of the Indo-Pacific. With 200 color photographs. (DIV18, $21.99)
 
 
Treasures of the Great Barrier Reef  •   WGBH   • NATURAL HISTORY  •  This 60-minute Nova documentary captures the diversity and abundance of the fish and invertebrates of the coral reef in dazzling color. (AUS196, $19.95)
 
 
Australian Birds  •   Pocket Naturalist   • FIELD GUIDE  •  A laminated card featuring commonly encountered Australian birds. (AUS99, $5.95)
 
 
Australian Wildlife  •  Raymond Leung  •  James Kavanaugh   • FIELD GUIDE  •  This handy, fold-out guide features illustrations of almost 150 species of Australian animals. Laminated and pocket-sized, it easily slips into your daypack. (AUS111, $5.95)
 
 
Diving and Snorkeling Guide to Australia's Great Barrier Reef  •  Len Zell   • FIELD GUIDE  •  A practical, illustrated guide to diving and snorkeling sites surrounding the Great Barrier Reef, with a short overview of the marine setting, ecology, coral reefs and inhabitants for each. (AUS27, $24.99)
 
 
Fishwatcher's Field Guide, Great Barrier Reef  •  Idaz Greenberg   • FIELD GUIDE  •  A double-sided, laminated card. (DIV41, $7.50)
 
 
Southern Night Sky  •   Pocket Naturalist   • FIELD GUIDE  •  A glow in the dark laminated card showing the most conspicuous stars, constellations and celestial objects of the Southern Hemisphere. (SCI30, $5.95)
 
 
The Slater Field Guide to Australian Birds  •  Peter Slater   • FIELD GUIDE  •  A comprehensive, beautifully illustrated guide. (AUS240, $24.95)
 
 


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For Kids
Worth Looking For
Sydney & New South Wales
Queensland & the Great Barrier Reef
The Kimberley & Northern Australia
Tasmania