Crossing the Lines: The Story of Three Homosexual New Zealand Soldiers in WWII by Brent Coutts

$50.00 NZD

Category: NZ History/Society

In Crossing the Lines, Brent Coutts brings to light the previously untold history of New Zealand homosexual soldiers in World War II, drawing on the experiences of ordinary men who lived through extraordinary times. At the centre of the story are New Zealand soldiers Harold Robinson, Ralph Dyer and Doug las Morison, who shared a queer identity and love of performance. Through their roles as female impersonators in Kiwi concert parties in the Pacific and Egypt they found a place to live as gay men within the military forces, boosting the morale of personnel in the Pacific Campaign and, along the way, falling in love with some of the men they met. Crossing the Lines is a richly illustrated account that follows the men from their formative pre-war lives, through the difficult wartime years to their experiences living in a postwar London where they embraced the many new possibilities available. It is a story of strong friendships, the search for love and belonging as homosexuals within the military and civilian worlds, and the creation of the foundation of the queer community today. ...Show more

Fourteen (PB) by Shannon Molloy

$35.00 NZD

Category: Biography

Fourteen is this generation's Holding the Man - a moving coming-of-age memoir about a young man's search for identity and acceptance in the most unforgiving and hostile of places: high school. This is a story about my fourteenth year of life as a gay kid at an all-boys rugby-mad Catholic school in regio nal Queensland. It was a year in which I started to discover who I was, and deeply hated what was revealed. It was a year in which I had my first crush and first devastating heartbreak. It was a year of torment, bullying and betrayal - not just at the hands of my peers, but by adults who were meant to protect me. And it was a year that almost ended tragically. I found solace in writing and my budding journalism; in a close-knit group of friends, all growing up too quickly together; and in the fierce protection of family and a mother's unconditional love. These were moments of light and hilarity that kept me going. As much as Fourteen is a chronicle of the enormous struggle and adversity I endured, and the shocking consequences of it all, it's also a tale of survival. Because I did survive. ‘Teenagers should read this book, parents should read this book. Human beings, above all, should read this book.' Rick Morton bestselling author of One Hundred Years of Dirt ‘I love this book … a beautifully written account of a young man struggling with his sexuality, overcoming shocking abuse and finding his way to pride.' Peter FitzSimons, bestselling author ‘Shannon is unflinching in recounting the horror, but he is also funny, empathetic and, above all, full of courage.' Bridie Jabour, author of The Way Things Should Be ‘A slice of life as experienced quite recently in the “lucky country”.' The Hon Michael Kirby, AC CMG ...Show more

Over the Top - A Raw Journey to Self-Love by Jonathan Van Ness

$27.00 NZD

Category: Biography

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER NPR'S FAVORITE BOOKS OF THE YEAR INDIE BESTSELLER GOODREADS CHOICE AWARD WINNER: BEST MEMOIR & AUTOBIOGRAPHY     A laugh-and-cry-out-loud memoir from the beloved star of Netflix's Queer Eye, Jonathan Van Ness Who gave Jonathan Van Ness permission to be the radiant hu man he is today? No one, honey. The truth is, it hasn't always been gorgeous for this beacon of positivity and joy. Before he stole our hearts as the grooming and self-care expert on Netflix's hit show Queer Eye, Jonathan was growing up in a small Midwestern town that didn't understand why he was so...over the top. From choreographed carpet figure skating routines to the unavoidable fact that he was Just. So. Gay., Jonathan was an easy target and endured years of judgement, ridicule and trauma--yet none of it crushed his uniquely effervescent spirit. Over the Top uncovers the pain and passion it took to end up becoming the model of self-love and acceptance that Jonathan is today. In this revelatory, raw, and rambunctious memoir, Jonathan shares never-before-told secrets and reveals sides of himself that the public has never seen. JVN fans may think they know the man behind the stiletto heels, the crop tops, and the iconic sayings, but there's much more to him than meets the Queer Eye. You'll laugh, you'll cry, and you'll come away knowing that no matter how broken or lost you may be, you're a Kelly Clarkson song, you're strong, and you've got this. --The New York Times ...Show more

Aidan, 19: So Far by Aidan Cahill

$5.00 NZD

$35.00 (85% off)

Category: Biography

Aidan was one of dozens and possibly hundreds of young men and women on New Zealand's streets. How do you meet someone in this situation, even if you have such an interest? How do they survive? Why are they in such a position? What are their aspirations? Such citizens of New Zealand are on the margins a nd few of us get anywhere close to those margins. Aidan's unconventional life story, so far, is a revelation for anyone interested in an aspect of life that is rarely, if ever, revealed with such candour. His story begins in his home town of Christchurch, New Zealand's Garden City in its South Island. His father died when he was four. His mother had her own challenges at that time and as a result, Aidan was left with an aunt, who having been asked to `baby sit' him, did so selflessly for ten years. Having moved to Wellington, New Zealand's capital, at the age of just 16, Aidan soon moved to Auckland, where he lived on the streets of New Zealand's largest city. There he worked out, on his own, how to survive in some of the city's toughest neighbourhoods. You will read of his good and bad decisions. When he makes mistakes, he describes how, with brutal honesty. This story shows how Aidan can now go into shops and offices and not feel out of place. How he can engage with people and not feel he's being judged. How he moved from the streets to his own room in an apartment in Auckland's CBD and then into his own room with a good friend in a lovely townhouse in an Auckland suburb. Aidan has now expanded his friendships to include people who are not necessarily on the margins of New Zealand's society. And most importantly, he has learned that there is something he can do, other than contribute to the sex industry, and that is to write. ...Show more

People I've Met from the Internet by Stephen van Dyck

$42.00 NZD

Category: Biography

Literary Nonfiction. LGBTQIA Studies. Art. Performance Art. Hybrid Genre. Memoir. California Interest. Stephen van Dyck's PEOPLE I'VE MET FROM THE INTERNET is a queer reimagining of the coming-of-age narrative set at the dawn of the internet era. In 1997, AOL is first entering suburban homes just as thi rteen-year-old Stephen is coming into his sexuality, constructing selves and cruising in the fantasyscape of the internet. Through strange, intimate, and sometimes perilous physical encounters with the hundreds of men he finds there, Stephen explores the pleasures and pains of growing up, contends with his mother's homophobia and early death, and ultimately searches for a way of being in the world. Spanning twelve years, the book takes the form of a very long annotated list, tracking Stephen's journey and the men he meets from adolescence in New Mexico to post-recession adulthood in Los Angeles, creating a multi-dimensional panorama of gay men's lives as he searches for glimpses of utopia in the available world. ...Show more

Moonlite: The Tragic Love Story of Captain Moonlite and the Bloody End of the Bushrangers by Garry Linnell

$40.00 NZD

Category: Biography

Charismatic, intelligent and handsome, George Scott is unlike any other bushranger. Born into a privileged life in famine-wracked Ireland, Scott's family loses its fortune and is forced to flee to New Zealand. There, Scott joins the local militia and fights as a soldier against the Maori in the brutal N ew Zealand wars. After recovering from a series of serious gunshot wounds, he sails to Australia and becomes a Lay Preacher, captivating churchgoers with his fiery and inspiring sermons. But Scott is also prone to bursts of madness. The local villagers back in Ireland often whispered that a 'wild drop' ran in the blood of the Scott family. One night he dons a mask in a small country town, arms himself with a gun and, dubbing himself Captain Moonlite, brazenly robs a bank before staging one of the country's most audacious jailbreaks. After falling in love with fellow prisoner James Nesbitt, a boyish petty criminal desperately searching for a father figure, Scott finds himself unable to shrug off his criminal past. Pursued and harassed by the police, he stages a dramatic siege and prepares for a final showdown with the law - and a macabre executioner without a nose. Meticulously researched and drawing on previously unpublished material, Moonlite is a brilliant work of non-fiction that reads like a novel. Told at a cracking pace, and based on many of the extensive letters Scott wrote from his death cell, Moonlite is set amid the violent and sexually-repressed era of Australia in the second half of the 19th century. With a cast of remarkable characters, it weaves together the extraordinary lives of our bushrangers and the desperation of a young nation eager to remove the stains of its convict past. But most of all, Moonlite is a tragic love story. For these are the dying days of the bushrangers and Captain Moonlite is about to make his last stand. ...Show more

Confess - The Autobiography by Rob Halford

$38.00 NZD

Category: Biography

Rob Halford is the legendary frontman of Judas Priest, one of the most successful heavy metal bands of all time.  Known as "The Metal God" by his devoted, global fan base, Rob Halford has always subverted the norm, and Confess will offer readers a compelling and honest look at the struggles he has faced with addiction and his sexuality as well as exploring his music and his many brushes with controversy.There have been few vocalists in the history of heavy metal whose singing style has been as influential and instantly recognizable as Halford's. Confess, published to coincide with the 50th anniversary of Judas Priest -- and described by Halford himself as "exciting, fun, disturbing, and terrifying" -- will celebrate five decades of the guts and glory of rock-n-roll. ...Show more

To The End Of The World - Travels with Oscar Wilde by Rupert Everett

$40.00 NZD

Category: Biography

The extraordinary and outrageous memoir from award-winning writer and actor Rupert Everett. They say that sometimes ghosts don't realise they're dead and wander around screaming because no one is paying them any attention. Well, in show business you may have been dead five years before you finally twig . You howl around the corridors of power while the elect march straight through. Then one day you catch yourself in a mirror and there is nothing looking back. In his highly anticipated third memoir, Rupert Everett tells the story of how he set out to make a film of Oscar Wilde's last days, and how that ten-year quest almost destroyed him. (And everyone else.) Travelling across Europe for the film, he weaves in extraordinary tales from his past, remembering wild times, freak encounters and lost friends. There are celebrities, of course. But we also meet glamorous but doomed Aunt Peta, who introduces Rupert (aged three) to the joys of make-up. In '90s Paris, his great friend Lychee burns bright, and is gone. While in '70s London, a 'weirdly tall, beyond size zero' teenage Rupert is expelled from the Central School of Speech and Drama. Unflinchingly honest and hugely entertaining, To the End of the World offers a unique insight into the 'snakes and ladders' of filmmaking. It is also a soulful and thought-provoking autobiography from one of our best-loved and most talented actors and writers. ...Show more

Hudson and Halls: The Food of Love by Joanne Drayton

$50.00 NZD

Category: NZ Biographies

Hudson & Halls: The food of love is more than just a love story, though a love story it certainly is. It is a tale of two television chefs who helped change the bedrock bad attitudes of a nation in the 1970s and 80s to that unspoken thing - homosexuality. Peter Hudson and David Halls became reluctan t role models for a 'don't ask, don't tell' generation of gay men and women who lived by omission. They were also captains of a culinary revolution that saw the overthrow of Aunty Daisy and Betty Crocker and the beginnings of Pacific-rich, Asian-styled international cuisine. Their drinking, bitching and bickering on screen, their spontaneous unchoreographed movements across the stage that left cameras and startled production staff exposed broke taboos and melted formalities. They captivated an unlikely bunch of viewers, from middle-aged matrons to bush-shirted blokes. Hudson and Halls were pioneers of celebrity television as we know it today: the naughty, not-quite-normal boys next door who rocketed to stardom on untrained talent and a dream. When Peter Hudson became seriously ill with prostate cancer, David Halls was inconsolable. What remained unchanged through it all was their abiding love for each other. In this riveting, fast-paced and meticulously researched book, New York Times bestselling author Joanne Drayton celebrates the legacy of the unforgettable Hudson and Halls. ...Show more

Bohemian Rhapsody the Definitive Biography of Freddie Mercury by Lesley-Ann Jones

$25.00 NZD

Category: Biography

'Exactly the sort of tribute Mercury himself would have wanted' SPECTATOR This is the definitive biography of Freddie Mercury. Written by an award-winning rock journalist, Lesley-Ann Jones toured widely with Queen forming lasting friendships with the band. Now, having secured access to the remaining ba nd members and those who were closest to Freddie, from childhood to death, Lesley-Ann has written the most in depth account of one of music's best loved and most complex figures. Meticulously researched, sympathetic, unsensational, the book will focus on the period in the 1980s when Queen began to fragment, before their Live Aid performance put them back in the frame. In her journey to understand the man behind the legend, Lesley-Ann Jones has travelled from London to Zanzibar to India. Packed with exclusive interviews and told with the invaluable perspective that the twenty years since Mercury's death presents, Freddie Mercury is the most up to date portrait of a legendary man. ...Show more

Nigel and Derek by Nigel Owens

$25.00 NZD

Category: Biography

Stories from on and off the pitch by two legendary Welsh referees.

Dear Oliver: Uncovering a Pakeha History by Peter Wells

$40.00 NZD

Category: NZ Biographies

When writer and historian Peter Wells found a cache of family letters amongst his elderly mother's effects, he realised that he had the means of retracing the history of a not-untypical family swept out to New Zealand during the great nineteenth-century human diaspora from Britain. His family experience d the war against Te Kooti, the Boer War, the Napier earthquake of 1931 and the Depression. They rose from servant status to thecomforts of the middle class. There was army desertion, suicide, adultery, AIDS, secrets and lies. There was also success, prosperity and social status. In digging deep into their stories, examining letters from the past and writing a letter to the future, Peter Wells constructs a novel and striking way to view the history of Pakeha New Zealanders. ...Show more