Larrikins in Khaki cover art

Larrikins in Khaki

 Preview
Try Premium Plus free
1 credit a month to buy any audiobook in our entire collection.
Access to thousands of additional audiobooks and Originals from the Plus Catalogue.
Member-only deals & discounts.
Auto-renews at $16.45/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Larrikins in Khaki

By: Tim Bowden
Narrated by: Stephen Hunter
Try Premium Plus free

Auto-renews at $16.45/mo after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for $27.99

Buy Now for $27.99

About this listen

With a reputation for being frank, hard to discipline and generous to their comrades and for sticking it up any sign of pomposity, Australian soldiers were a wild and irreverent lot, even in the worst of circumstances during World War II.

In Larrikins in Khaki, Tim Bowden has collected compelling and vivid stories of individual soldiers whose memoirs were mostly self-published and who told of their experiences with scant regard for literary pretensions and military niceties. NCOs and officers who were hopeless at their jobs were made aware of it - they laughed their way through the worst of it by taking the mickey out of one another and their superiors.

From recruitment and training to the battlegrounds of Palestine, North Africa, Thailand, New Guinea, Borneo and beyond, here are the highly individual stories of Australia's World War II Diggers told in their own voices - warts and all.

©2019 Tim Bowden (P)2019 Allen & Unwin Pty Limited Australia, New Zealand & Oceania Military Oceania World War Africa Solider Witty Imperial Japan
All stars
Most relevant  
I appreciated the collation of yarns and the manner in which the timeline was established and followed.

However, the absolute butchering of the pronunciations of military speak/words had me screaming in frustration. Anyone in the military knows how to pronounce “Provost”. There was poor execution of these aspects of place names as well. These should have been an easy study but “Raven Shoe” for the far north township of “Ravens-hoe” really took the cake.. Place names in New Guinea were poorly executed, Geez, place names in Australia had issues..

Having said that, the manner in which the narrator engaged with the characterisation of the voices was pretty bloody good.

Many times during this I almost stopped listening, but persisted.

As a compendium of yarns I liked the work. BUT….

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Tim’s books are always fantastic, this was no exception. Bunch of Stubborn buggers. Highly recommend. Great narration.

The best!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The book is well written and tells some great and amusing tales of Australian soldiers during WW2.
The reading was fair but included multiple mis-pronunciations of particular names and terms.

Interesting tales from the soldiers’ perspective

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The reading was very good and the stories are very well threaded together through time and theatres of war.
The stories of the men that fought while enduring more than many could in the deserts to the muddy jungles fighting jungle diseases while caring about your mates.
They are giants of Australia’s wartime history.
Just listen to the book you won’t be disappointed.

Giants of men.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Thankyou Tim, A great book, my Dad was a Rat of Tobruk, He said very little about the war, when he passed in 74, I was 12yo, all his pub mates called him a hero at 63yo now I realise he was indeed
Thankyou for your eye opening work
Perry Olive
Proud Son of a Rat.

Aussie Guts

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Before having listened to this book I had listened to 'POWs', Australians Under Nippon'.
Incredulously, I heard all those same stories. Not told by the Diggers themselves as in the book I mention, but told innacurately many times, littered with incorrect pronunciation of place names etc. Quotes attributed mistakenly to wrong persons and the list of wrongs go on and on.
How can a person put their name, a copyright no less on others work like this? It staggers me. Tim Bowden ought be ashamed, his copyright of this book torn up, and income derived from it split up and sent to the descendants of those who made the stories through blood and guts and tears.
Really, really diaappointed. I won't read another Bowden book without deep suspicion he has lifted it from somewhere or someone not around any more to call him out.
Audible ought trash this garbage and direct listeners to the real deal above.
Shameful!

Blatant Plagiarism

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
In the spirit of reconciliation, Audible acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of country throughout Australia and their connections to land, sea and community. We pay our respect to their elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today.