Art & Literature

A beautiful, intimate and inspiring investigation into how we can find and nurture within ourselves that essential quality of internal happiness - the 'light within' that Julia Baird calls 'phosphorescence' - which will sustain us even through the darkest times....

What could be a more tempting Christmas gift than a compendium of David Sedaris' best stories, selected by the author himself? From a spectacular career spanning almost three decades, these stories have become modern classics and are now for the first time collected in one volume....

On Writing is part biography, part a collection of tips for the aspiring writer....

What is the role of the writer? Prophet? High priest of art? Court jester? Or witness to the real world? Looking back on her own childhood and writing career, Margaret Atwood examines the metaphors which writers of fiction and poetry have used to explain - or excuse! - their activities....

This is the second part of Roald Dahl's remarkable life story, following on from Boy.... 

Murdoch is an innovator who has re-shaped a media industry across continents, from Australia to the UK to the US. He is a disruptor who has changed the nature of our politics with a steadfast focus on giving the people what he believes they want....

Thoreau's classic account of the solitary life describes his attempts to simplify his life and sort out his priorities by living alone in a cabin beside Walden Pond for nearly two years....

Eat, Pray, Love is a journey around the world, a quest for spiritual enlightenment, and a story for anyone who has battled with divorce, depression, and heartbreak....

You'll be wincing in recognition and scratching your head in incredulity, but like Marian herself you won't be able to stop laughing at the sheer delightful absurdity that is modern life....

A funny, insightful memoir by much-loved documentary maker Louis Theroux, taking us on a weird and wonderful journey through two decades of groundbreaking television....

When celebrated writer Joan Didion’s life was altered forever, she wrote a new chapter. In this adaptation of her iconic memoir, Didion transforms the story of the shattering loss of her husband and their daughter into a one-woman play performed by Tony Award winner Vanessa Redgrave....

The Apprentice is the poignant and sometimes funny tale of a boy's coming of age. Beyond that, it is the story of America's culinary awakening and the transformation of food from an afterthought to a national preoccupation....

Sarah Vowell argues that 1898 might be a year crucial to our nation's identity - the year the United States annexed Hawaii....

As a fan, player, writer, scholar, controversialist and administrator, Ram Guha has spent a life with cricket. In this book, Guha offers both a brilliantly charming memoir and a charter of the life of cricket in India....

Brilliantly compiled and edited, and filled with detail and anecdote, Daily Rituals is irresistible, addictive, magically inspiring....

Hailed as "a fearless exposer of folly, vice, and crime" when it first hit the streets in the 1890s, Truth was later condemned by a High Court Judge as "a wretched little paper, reeking of filth, injurious to the health of house servants and young girls"....

No book ever written has more perfectly captured the spirit of the 1960s counterculture....

In Talking to GOATs, award-winning broadcaster Jim Gray looks back at his four decades of sports reporting from the unparalleled perspective of one of the world’s most respected and skilled interviewers....

Alannah Hill, one of Australia’s most successful fashion designers, created an international fashion brand that defied trends with ornamental, sophisticated elegance, beads, bows and vintage florals....

Everyone knows Steve Madden's name and his shoes, but few are familiar with his story. In this raw, intimate, and ultimately inspiring book, Madden holds nothing back as he shares what it took to get here and the lessons he's learned along the way....

Discover what truly happens behind the scenes in the world of high fashion in this detailed, storied memoir from fashion icon and former Vogue creative director André Leon Talley....

Rhodesia, 1964: a small boy witnesses the death of his neighbor, murdered by guerrillas - it is the beginning of the end of white rule in Africa. In Mukiwa, Peter Godwin, the witness to that murder, has written a vivid, moving account of growing up in a colony rapidly collapsing....

James Boswell forever changed the genre of biography when he transformed a scholarly profusion of detail into a perceptive, lifelike portrait of Dr. Samuel Johnson....

Technology affects almost everything we do, and its possibilities can be both exhilarating and daunting. This collection features two radio documentaries exploring Douglas Adams’ vision of the digital future, plus Did Douglas Get It Right?, presented by Mitch Benn.... 

On the 200th anniversary of Jane Austen's death, historian Lucy Worsley leads us into the world in which our best-loved novelist lived....

Homage to Catalonia is George Orwell’s account of his experiences fighting in the Spanish Civil War....

Anthony Rapp captures the passion and grit of the theater world as he recounts his life-changing experience in the original cast of the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical Rent....