Books published by NewSouth Publishing

Tells the never-before-told story of World War II escape artist extraordinaire, Johnny Peck. In August 1941, an eighteen-year-old Australian soldier made his first prison break an audacious night-time escape from a German prisoner-of-war camp in Crete. Astoundingly, this was only the first of many escapes.

In 1950 Australian prime minister Robert Menzies blithely agreed to atomic tests that offered no benefit to Australia and relinquished control over them - and left the public completely in the dark. This book reveals the devastating consequences of that decision. It is a meticulously researched and shocking work.

Offers a powerful literary consideration of historic violence in two different parts of the world, the seldom-visited mulga plains of south-west Queensland and the backroads of rural Andalusia. The book is also an unashamed celebration of the landscapes where this violence has been carried out.

The white colonisers of Australia suffered from Alliumphobia, a fear of garlic. Local cooks didn't touch the stuff and it took centuries for that fear to lift. This food history of Australia shows we held onto British assumptions about produce and cooking for a long time and these fed our views on racial hierarchies and our place in the world. Before Garlic we had meat and potatoes; After Garlic what we ate got much more interesting. But has a national cuisine emerged? What is Australian food culture?Renowned food writer John Newton visits haute cuisine or fine dining restaurants, the cafes and mid-range restaurants, and heads home to the dinner tables as he samples what everyday people have cooked and eaten over centuries. His observations and recipes old and new, show what has changed and what hasn't changed as much as we might think even though our chefs are hailed as some of the best in the world.

Climate change is happening. The world is changing. In this extraordinarily powerful and moving book, leading Australian writers come together to reflect on what it is like to be alive during an ecological crisis as the physical world changes all around us.

Katerina Bryant's debut Hysteria is an astounding hybrid memoir exploring chronic mental illness and the treatment of women's health throughout history. In the tradition of Siri Hustvedt's The Shaking Woman, Bryant blends memoir with literary and historical analysis to explore women's medical treatment.

The first comprehensive history of Australia's university sector, this book explores how universities work and for whom, and how their relationship with each other, their academics and students and the public has evolved over a century.

Bold and fearless, this book does more than help you find your inner statistician. It helps us to understand the way we live now and how we might shape our future. Looking beyond births, deaths and marriages, Liz Allen takes apart inequality, migration, tax, home ownership, and shares her own "life course".

A nation often amends its laws during war, not least to regulate life at home. Yet few historians have considered the impact of law on everyday lives in Australia during the Great War. In this original book, Catherine Bond breathes life into the laws that were central to the way that people's daily lives were managed from Australia 1914 to 1918.

The saviour of many and cursed by the wayward, trackers live in the collective memory as one of the few examples where Aboriginal people's skills were sought after in colonial society. Pathfinders brings the work of trackers to the forefront of New South Wales law enforcement history, ensuring their contribution is properly acknowledged.

Explores connections between Australia and India through the lens of the British Empire, by tracing the lives of people of Indian descent in Australia, from Australian Federation to Indian independence.

No props. No music. No costumes. Just you, your words and a mic - you've got two minutes to make the crowd scream your name. Miles Merrill, performance poet and founder of Australian Poetry Slam, and award-winning teacher Narcisa Nozica will take you from novice to spoken word superstar in no time.

Australian women's football rides high on the sporting landscape now, but this book shows that success has been one-hundred years in the making. It shares stories of triumph in the face of overwhelming odds, and tales of heartbreak and obstacles that seem insurmountable. But it is also about community, endurance and collective success.

Reflects on the aftermath of World War I and the commemoration of its centenary. Provocative essays from a diverse group of historians discuss the profound ways in which World War I not only affected Australia's political system and informed decades of national security policy but shaped our sense of who we are, for better or worse.

Swimming is a central part of most Australian childhoods. We idealise beaches and surf, but for many kids the local pool - whether it's an ocean, tidal or a chlorinated pool - is where they pass summer days. Evocative, funny and sometimes bittersweet, almost 30 people remember the pools that shaped their childhoods.

This ninth edition of The Best Australian Science Writing showcases the most powerful, colourful, insightful and brilliant news, feature, essay and poetry writing from Australian writers and scientists. It roams the length and breadth of science. It makes us think, feel and hopefully act.

At what point does the will to survive on the battlefield give way to bloodlust? What turns men into killers? Acclaimed historian Peter Monteath draws on records and recollections of Australian, New Zealand, German and British forces and local Cretans to reveal the truth behind one of the most gruesome battles of World War II.

Millions of Australian feed wild birds in their gardens. Yet there is currently very little information or advice on offer to tell them how to do this properly. This book provides the first readily available source of reliable information relevant to Australia.

Wild, passionate and ultimately tragic: the love story of Australia's famous literary couple, Charmian Clift and George Johnston, plays out on the idyllic Greek island of Hydra in the 1950s, in this reimagining from award-winning playwright Sue Smith.

They didn't know it, but Patti Miller and her brother, Barney, shared something in common - a passion for the illuminating joy of wild nature - with all its challenges and dangers. In this extraordinary book, Patti tells the story of her own long-distance walking over hundreds of kilometres in Europe and of her brother's obsession with paragliding.

Adapted from Andy Griffiths' and Terry Denton's phenomenally successful Treehouse book series, Richard Tulloch's play - The 13-Storey Treehouse - is action-packed, full of laughs...with a see-through swimming pool, a tank full of man-eating sharks and a lemonade fountain!

Outsiders think of South Australia as being different, without really knowing much about it. Combining his own travel across the million-square kilometres of the state with an investigation of its history, Ben Stubbs seeks to find out what South Australia is really like.

With insight, passion and an eye on history, Jane Goodall argues that as the ravages of neo-liberalism tear ever more deeply into the social fabric, the principle of the commons should be restored to the heart of our politics.

Tells the extraordinary story of the mostly migrant workforce who built one of the world's engineering marvels. This classic, prize-winning account of the remarkable Snowy Scheme is available again for the 70th anniversary of this epic nation-building project.

When Mark Dapin first interviewed Vietnam veterans and wrote about the war, he swallowed (and regurgitated) every misconception. He wasn't alone. In Australia's Vietnam, Dapin reveals that every stage of Australia's commitment to the Vietnam War has been misunderstood, misinterpreted and shrouded in myth.

It seems that not even world war could stop crime in Sydney. In fact, World War Noir confirms that war and crime - in the form of sex, drugs, alcohol, racketeering and other illicit activities - go hand in hand.

Reveals who owned Australia's newspapers and how they used them to wield political power. A corporate and political history of Australian newspapers spanning 140 years, this book explains how Australia's media system came to be dominated by a handful of empires and powerful family dynasties.

The Seventies was the decade that shaped modern Australia. In a lively and engaging style, Michelle Arrow has written a new history of this transformative decade; one that is more urgent, and more resonant, than ever.