"We were like two citizens press-ganged to fight in a cold and dirty war in a courtroom without any weapons."

If it is an article of faith with lawyers that a man who acts for himself has a fool for a client, then imagine what happens when two unremarkable men find themselves in the legal battle of their lives.

What started as a petty squabble over $115 spiralled out of control and involved every court in the country all the way to the High Court. Accused, sued, defamed; stumbling over shams, sexual predators and suicide; bashed and unemployed; our humble heroes, with relationships in ruins, teetering on the verge of bankruptcy; are forced to defend themselves in a court system gone completely insane.

An incredible, funny and profoundly personal story.

Six year old Tomas likes to play games, even amid the horror and devastation if the ghettos and concentration camps. But can his mother protect him and her unborn child from annihilation?

Far from being a tale of woe this true and unheard account of the Holocaust reveals a child’s profound innocence and the extraordinary resilience of the human spirit.

Lolli's Apple Teacher Kits are now available. Email tomas@lollisapple.com for your free kit to accompany this remarkable story by Tomas Fleischmann.

Ever watched a game of footy and wondered the hell was going on?

Offsides and onsides, mauls, hand balls, line-outs and line-ups, ball-ups and hit-ups, eight point tries and golden points.

Confused? Then this is surely the book for you. All four footy codes explained by one of the world’s foremost authorities on sport, Tony Squires, the only person ever to have played for Australia in all four footy codes. In his dreams.

What Tony lacks in the footy playing department is more than overcome by his experience as a sport journalist and an all round footy fanatic. It’s all explained, simply and clearly: the sublime beauty of an attacking back line in union, the gladiatorial contest that is league, the poetry in motion of football, and the truly awesome marks of AFL.

“For every bumbling, would-be handyman who ever haunted the corridors of a hardware store, and for every weekend widow who laughed till she cried at the do-it-yourself disasters happening before her very eyes.”

This beautifully simple story, told with a deft wit and a dry humour, is about the one elusive dream every man covets above all others – to be taken seriously by his own family.

Like Don Quixote before him, tilting at toolsheds, our humble hero embarks on a journey into the unknown which goes no further than his own backyard. Defeated at every turn, his only companion a reject goldfish, he loses everything precious to him, but emerges from the wilderness transformed to a fabulous new world. Moving. Inspired. A sheer delight.

You don’t have to be a war hero or a famous movie star to have a great story to tell. In this remarkable collection of true stories, every-day Australians bring to life in their own words those incredible moments of their lives where, seemingly in an instant, everything changes. Meet:

• The twenty something telemarketer who moments before her impending death as her car is about to be flattened by a 100 tonne crane, takes off her glasses so her face won’t be scratched;
• The refugee who was traded for a chicken on the battlefields of Europe,
• A puny agricultural scientist, so shy he shook hands rather than kiss the love of his life, takes on the heavy weight boxing champion of the Northern Territory to defend her honour.
• The hapless suburban accountant and his country bumpkin clients who somehow managed to outfox a multinational oil corporation;
• A lovelorn pig shooter who buys a wrecking yard as a way to meet girls;
• The irrepressible couple from Poland, who, after surviving the razing of Warsaw, set up a nightclub in the middle of their war ravaged country;
• An all too plain girl from Flackwell Heath, with long, lanky legs and buck teeth who was inspired by a chance encounter with Mahatma Gandhi on a beach in India to become a writer;
• And the Chinese orphan who went from Mao to God and along the way raised a family of four brilliant daughters in a one room house

What do Rugby greats Jim Miller, Gary Grey, Geoff Shaw, James Grant and Scott Fava have in common? They all started their professional rugby careers on the New South Wales south coast, country seaside town, Kiama.

Kiama Rugby Football Club (KRFC) was formed in 1960 by the determination of a small band of Rugby enthusiasts to establish a Rugby club in the area. Fifty years on, having stamped its mark as one of Australia’s leading Rugby clubs, Kiama has a renowned clubhouse, three highly competitive senior club teams with premierships, a swag of Australian Representative players, and the infamous pre-season tournament, the Kiama Sevens.  Add to this, is a very active "Golden Oldies" outfit and a large number of successful junior teams.

However, KRFC is not just about Rugby. It is about mate ship, community spirit and family. Kiama Rugby: The Club with a Past and a Future is a tribute to all the players and supporters over the last fifty years who helped create something truly special in the name of Rugby.

Two words sustained Martin van den Berk in his journey through life: faith and family. After witnessing the horrors of World War II as a boy in Holland, he mistakenly believed he had escaped the worst of it. Conscripted to carry our post-war reconstruction in Indonesia, Martin soon found himself in the middle of a deadly guerrilla war. He believes his faith saved him from certain death time and again. Determined to escape the devastation, Martin emigrated to New Zealand where he found a breathtakingly beautiful country and the woman who would give him seven children.

In this fearlessly frank, funny and sometimes extraordinary account of his life, Martin remembers the early years working as a mechanic, a farmer, and a baker; and somehow finding time to help his wife, Jane rear a family all the while pursuing his passion for tramping through the countryside with his beloved Scouts. Obsessed with multi-skilling decades before it became fashionable, he taught all his children to fend for themselves even though many of his own handyman adventures almost ended in calamity.

Raising a family of seven was never going to be easy, especially when mother and father liked to up stumps and move every couple of years, but somehow the van den Berks prospered and thrived. This story has it all – hard heartless work, strokes of good fortune, lives imperilled by deadly bushfires, bad luck, miraculous recoveries and being struck down in one’s prime – the family’s triumphs as well as tragedies – guided all the while by Martin’s unshakeable faith and unconditional love.

Most kids can only dream of swapping the rigours of school for a life of adventure on the sun licked sand dunes of the Arabian Desert, but for Sally Brown this is where her education began. Tedious textbooks, arduous mathematical equations and poncy school teachers were ditched for camel riding, horse races and swimming or camping in the mountains on the Turkish/Iraqi border.  With her grandfather a Brigadier-General in the British Army in India and her father, a Group Captain of the RAF, Sally was destined to have an exotic upbringing.

Follow Sally from Egypt to the London bombings of World War II, then to Habbaniya, just outside Baghdad, and from there on to the clean-up of Germany after the war. As a young woman she lived through the swinging sixties in London where she met the love of her life. True to the nomadic patterns of her childhood years, Sally and her husband, Tony, moved to the blue skies of Australia where they lived in almost every state including some of the most remote and isolated settings in the country. Along the way, they encounter a spectacular array of eccentric characters, all the while, trying to raise their three daughters, Mandy, Nicola and Jess.

In this honest and heartfelt, beautiful story, Sally extricates the trials and tribulations of motherhood and the inherent loneliness that accompanies it. In an ode to her own mother, Sally reflects on her relationship with her parents, the constraints of the English class system, the dynamics of human relations in secluded towns, and the sacrifices made out of love for one’s children. A must read for all mothers and daughters.

Ever wanted to write a book, but never knew where to being? Well, one of the first rules is don’t start at the beginning. If words are not your stock in trade, this book will show you how to develop the skills you need to trawl through millions of memories in your head and convert what you want to say into a form of words on a page.

Creating Mosaics with Words explains the simple, practical, easy-to-follow method of writing a book which tells your unique story in a compelling and enjoyable way. Whether your twenty-eight or eighty-eight, this is one experience you will never forget and your story will forever be remembered.

On his arrival in Australia in 1939, Sigurd Sjoquist did what every respectable Danish gentleman did when it came to employment. He placed an advertisement in the newspaper which announced his arrival, listed his many qualifications, attributes and interests, and his current availability. Sig waited for the offers to roll in, but there were none. When none were forthcoming, the only job he could find was lugging carcasses in a slaughterhouse and shovelling tonnes of coal, wondering all the while what had ever possessed him to come to this strange land.

Sig was joined by his beloved Kirsten and shortly after their marriage, he volunteered for the Australian Army. He was dispatched to the Northern Territory with an advance party to halt the seemingly unstoppable advance of the Imperial Japanese Army. It was here that he learned survival skills from Xavier Herbert, the author of the novel Capricornia, and began to understand the character of these no nonsense Australians who had scant regard for the finer distinctions of class that still prevailed in Europe.

He returned from the war a mental and physical wreck. Kirsten thought he could regain his former vitality by taking art classes. Yet, it was Kirsten who found she had a natural talent as a painter exhibiting successfully in Sydney and New York. From such terrible beginnings, Sig went on to create the Mercator business empire, raise a family, and through his involvement with Rotary and other community groups, forge everlasting bonds between the people of his old home and his new found land.

This all too plain girl, with huge projecting teeth, and long, lanky legs had boundless energy. She loved racing, jumping, swimming, climbing trees, more often standing on her head, seeing the world upside down. Isabel was marvellous with children. She worked as a nurse, and then met and married, Christian Matthews, a saxophonist and occasional chauffeur who ran his own laundry. After the birth of their two boys they went to live in India where Christian served with the RAF. With nannies caring for the children and plenty of servants, Isabel wrote her first story, Pongo Land, about a magical island where the trees grew beautiful china and cutlery, and where children never had to go to school. The publishers, Thacker & Co reacted by printing every story she ever wrote.

After the war, it was back to England, living for a time at Hunt Copse Farm, which was reputedly where Alfred the Great burnt the cakes. Then it was off to Australia, followed by further adventures in America and back to England where Christian worked as a chauffeur for the legendary actor, Rex Harrison. This is a life of wonderful observations, rich in experience, like walking along the beach in Juhu, conversing with the Indian spiritual and political leader, Mahatma Gandhi, about the beauty of the moon and the sea, in fact, a fairy tale life.

From a humble beginning in a housing commission home in Hobart, to the Senior Executive ranks with corporate high flyers, Coco-Cola and Fosters, what really motivated Rod from a very early age was the desire to race cars. That motivation turned into an absolute passionate drive to succeed in his chosen sport – something that many people never really understood and probably to this day, never will. Beginning cautiously, albeit successfully, in 1979, his desire to be the best never waned, and after 13 years in the sport that captured wins, a Tasmanian Championship, British Championship placings, a drive with Peter Brock, and a reputation in England as a hard charger, his dream was abruptly cut short at Brands Hatch in 1991 after an horrific crash.

From the absolute highs of motor-racing, fatherhood, world travel, corporate life, entertainment, and sport, to the other side of life, he has endured divorce and broken partnerships, career ruining accidents, estranged family relationships, separation from his son, and severe depression. Through all this, nothing has ever taken away Rod Barrett's Will to Win.

Edward (Ted) Bromley was sent to The Kings School as a nine year old boarder where he claimed never to have learned a thing. His school career was unremarkable and he started his working life as a ledger keeper with the Perpetual Trustee Company. Ted's passion was rowing, and in a career spanning three decades, he won four consecutive Kings Cup victories from 1933 to 1936, a record that has never been equalled. He competed at the 1938 Empire Games and the 1948 London Olympics. When he gave up competitive rowing in 1950, The Sydney Morning Herald headline read “Australia’s Finest Oarsman Retires”. Throughout his life, he maintained an active interest in rowing, and generously set up trust funds to assist future generations of rowers.

Quite by chance, he became involved in the timber industry and during his career built timber mills at Singleton, Putty, Craven Plateau, Woolooma, and Muswellbrook. Ted was a complex man with an amazing memory. He had strong beliefs in the rights of the individual, and when a mining company attempted to mine coal on his farm, Ted courageously and single-handedly took them on. This David and Goliath legal battle went all the way to the Privy Council in England where Ted won an astonishing victory.

If you imagined the teenage memoirs of a private schoolgirl and doctor’s daughter from upper middle class Melbourne would be a lacklustre affair, you are so not cool.

This mad, bad, crazy, beautiful misunderstood girl has packed enough living into life to a last a dozen lifetimes: the nineties teenager from hell, bombed out on ecstasy by the age of fourteen and an alcoholic at fifteen, the wild woman of the noughties, the pill-popping party girl trollied to the max who set up a cocaine business right under the noses of Carl Williams and the notorious Carlton Crew who were too busy murdering each other to notice.

Sex, rape, madness and suicide, in and out of nightclubs, psychiatric hospitals and gaols while freebasing crack cocaine between bouts of bulimia and anorexia as she rocked on down the highway to hell. Yellow Melody is the compilation of memories and music of a young woman riddled with self doubt, with one foot in the grave, of a girl who is so irrational and base crazy, that at times the humour is absurdly funny. Wild. One in a million.

Irina was born in Russia literally in the middle of the Eastern Front of World War Two when the German and Russian armies were embroiled in a fight to the death. Her family were refugees and during the retreat became separated. Surrounded by death, destruction, starvation and bloodshed Irina was sold by her grandmother to a Polish family for the price of a chicken.

She survived the war, was reunited with her family and they migrated to Australia in 1948. Irina speaks of her experiences growing up in a new country in the 1950s, falling in and out of love and back for more, the hilarious adventures she had travelling overseas, discovering her talent as an artist, the incredible excitement of finding herself rich almost overnight, from boom to bust and clawing your way back again, finding her wonderful soul mate, marriage, children and the whole damned thing.

This is the story of the Cockney son of a Jewish tailor who grew up in Australia, a difficult child who rebelled against his parents, who rose from being a humble clerk at AGL to managing one of the world’s great shipping lines. Aptly nick-named ‘the little wanderer’ as a child, there are so many twists and turns in Matt Lurie life it’s like riding a roller coaster around the world.

An exceptional man in the tourism and hospitality industry, Matt is a people person with boundless energy. His great skills and genuine personal charm were legendary and he was instrumental in founding the Pacific Area Travel Association. Matt overcame moments of great personal tragedy to move ahead and forge a new life all the while moving from Fiji, to Honolulu, to Auckland, to San Francisco, to San Diego and back to Australia.