Dad’s the word: Upcoming father’s day titles

13 June 2012 Books+Publishing

Spare dads the socks and ties this year with a selection of well-chosen Father’s Day titles. Kate Blackwood rounds up some of the best.

Sports and music
For sports-mad dads there is much to choose from: Legends of the Australian Football Hall of Fame (Slattery Media, August) celebrates the AFL’s greatest names, while Hardmen (Malcolm Andrews, A&U, August) tells the stories of 52 of rugby league’s ‘roughest, toughest and most courageous players’. There’s also Will Evans’ A Short History of Rugby League in Australia (Slattery Media, August), which offers an exhaustive account of the game’s evolution from union to league.

Sporting memoirs include Gaz (Random House, August), the candid autobiography of league champion Mark Gasnier; Mickey O (ABC Books, August), which charts the career of AFL legend Michael O’Loughlin; and Hard Yakka (Macmillan, August), the life-story of league great and Parramatta Eels captain Nathan Hindmarsh.

If footy chants aren’t music to dad’s ears, the following titles might do the trick. Abbey Road (Bloomsbury, September) is a photographic ode to the most famous recording studio in the world with a foreword by Beatles producer George Martin.

The Rolling Stones: 50 (Thames and Hudson, July) is an authorised collection of photographs, anecdotes and ephemera from the rock legends’ half-century history, written and curated by the band itself, and Elvis in Vegas (Bloomsbury, May) by Paul Lichter is a compilation of never-before-seen photographs, set lists, news clippings and interviews from Elvis’ Las Vegas years.

Page-turners
Greg Barron’s debut novel Rotten Gods (HarperCollins, July) is a darkly imaginative page-turner about a world on the brink of catastrophe, that will please thrill-seeking dads. There’s also action aplenty in David Rollins’ newest Vin Cooper thriller War Lord (Pan Macmillan, July) and screenwriter Steve Worland’s debut Velocity (Penguin, September); Worland, the husband of Georgie Parker, is being tipped as the next Matthew Reilly.

7.30 reporter Chris Uhlmann and Australian journalist Steve
Lewis have teamed up to write a ‘rollicking romp through the dark underbelly of Australian politics’ in The Marmalade Files (HarperCollins, August), which will have political junkies trying to guess who’s who; while Stuart Littlemore’s eponymous renegade barrister is embroiled in more fascinating criminal trials in Harry Curry: The Murder Book (HarperCollins, August).

Food and drink
If the way to Dad’s heart is through his stomach then Pete Evans’ Pizza (Murdoch Books, July), with its 90 mouthwatering recipes and vibrant photography, is a guaranteed winner.

Other releases to satisfy the epicurean dad include Alex Mackay’s Everybody, Everyday (Bloomsbury, July), which offers variations on everyday staples; The Food Clock: A Year of Cooking Seasonally by Better Homes and Gardens’ ‘Fast’ Ed Halmagyi (HarperCollins, August); and the Little Veggie Patch Co’s Guide to Backyard Farming (Fabian Capomolla & Mat Pember, Plum, September), which includes seasonal recipes alongside advice for planting and harvesting.

For league fans, Footy Flavours (Random House, August) presents 75 recipes that are close to the hearts of our favourite rugby league players and legends, and to quench a thirst: Extreme Brewing: A Deluxe Edition with 14 New Homebrew Recipes (Quarry Books, May).

Politics, history and military
Politically minded dads will enjoy Lindsay Tanner’s bestselling examination of political reportage Sideshow: Dumbing Down Democracy, re-released by Scribe in July. Or for something a little lighter, UnAustralian of the Year (Scribe, July) by cartoonist Bill Leak, takes a satirical look at Australia’s recent political history, with artwork and witticisms on ‘the inane arguments’ between people on both sides of the political divide.

In history, Under the Southern Cross by Geoff Hocking (Five Mile Press, August) tells the story of the rebels, democrats, thinkers, artists and activists—from the miners of the Eureka uprising to the songwriters of Cold Chisel, Yothu Yindi and the Midnight Oils—who fought for Australian democracy, while The True Story of Ned Kelly’s Last Stand by Paul Terry (A&U, August) promises new information about the Australian icon’s final bloody siege.

Vietnam: The Complete Story of the Australian War (A&U, August) is a comprehensive account of Australia’s involvement in the Vietnam War, written by Bruce David and Gary McKay. A different approach to the same subject is Well Done, Those Men (Barry Heard, Scribe), the moving memoir of a Vietnam veteran, which was voted one of the National Year of Reading’s ‘Our Story’ winners. It will be re-published in August as a special gift edition.

Literary fiction
For lovers of literary fiction, Beneath the Darkening Sky (Hamish Hamilton, July) by Sudanese-Australian author Majok Tulba is one of Penguin’s most-anticipated debuts of the year. It’s the fictional story of a Sudanese child soldier’s struggle to retain his humanity after he is thrust into a world of violence.

Newcomer Zane Lovitt delivers 10 compelling detective stories centred around a world-weary private investigator in his literary crime novel The Midnight Promise (Text, September), while prolific author Nick Earls explores life’s ordinary moments with heart and humour in his latest short-story collection Welcome to Normal (Vintage, July).

From overseas, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Richard Ford’s Canada (Bloomsbury, June) is the story of a family wrenched apart by robbery and murder.

Cars and dogs
To get Dad’s motor running, Great Australian Ute Stories by John Bryant (ABC Books, September) is an irreverent collection of yarns about that grand Australian icon: the ute. Tony Davis’s Total Lemons (ABC Books, August) takes a look back over the flawed, the ugly and the just-plain-funny names from automotive history, from the Lightburn Zeta to the Daihatsu Naked—and everything in between.

Dedicated to man’s other best friend, the critically acclaimed How the Dog became the Dog by Mark Derr (Bloomsbury, June) explores canine evolution from savage wolf to human companion. Locally, Australian Mongrel by David Darcy (Murdoch Books, August) is a down-to-earth celebration of the ‘real dogs’ that accompany our everyday lives—from working dogs to urban mutts—and contains vibrant photographs of dogs in the Australian landscape.

Picture books
Fathers to little ones will love the picture books on offer, including Andrew Daddo and Emma Quay’s board book Daddy’s Cheeky Monkey (ABC Books, August); Rosie Smith and Bruce Whatley’s My Dad’s the Coolest (Scholastic, August); and Random House sales and marketing director Justin Ractliffe’s picture-book debut Dads: A Field Guide (illus by Cathie Glassby, Random House, August).

Walker Books is publishing new paperback editions of Father’s Day favourites My Dads (Kelly Bennett), with its unique portrayal of blended families; and My Dad Thinks He’s Funny (Katrina Germain, illus by Tom Jellet), which was highly commended in the 2011 Prime Minister’s Literary Awards. Both are due out in August.

Also look out for My Fantastic Father (Susannah McFarlane & Lachlan Creagh, Scholastic, August) from the ‘Little Mates’ series.

Memoirs and humour
Memoirs on offer this Father’s Day are an eclectic mix: Fit, Fifty and Fired Up by Nigel Marsh (A&U, August) is the follow-up to Marsh’s previous offering Fat, Forty and Fired, and examines the big questions about getting fulfilment out of life; Mungo MacCallum’s memoir Eat My Words (ABC Books, August) shares the political journalist’s food experiences from around the world; and Hear Me Roar: The Story of a Stay-At-Home Dad by Ben Robertson (UQP, April) is a witty and honest account of fatherhood that will appeal to fathers and mothers alike.

Man vs Life by Rob Pegley (Murdoch Books, August) is a light-hearted look at man’s ambitions and achievements, written in the style of a PowerPoint business report. Full of laughs, this book pokes fun at the concept of the mid-life crisis, while reassuring men that they’re not alone in lamenting their lapsed dreams.

Category: Features