Bland came to NSW as a convict in 1814 after killing a fellow naval officer in a duel. Four decades later he was feted as the Venerable patriot of Australia at the celebration of the inauguration of responsible government. recognition of, among other services, his work with W.C. Wentworth in securing the colony's first elective legislature.

Following the Battle of Bunker Hill in early July of 1775, George Washington takes command of the seventeen thousand men who lay siege to the city of Boston, where General Thomas Gage and his four thousand regular army troops valiantly hold out. Parliament and representatives of Great Britain no longer listen to the complaints and requests of the colonials and decline to negotiate the issues. Like his fellow members of Congress, Washington is committed to an early end of the conflict. Washington determines that, by improving the negotiating position of the American colonists, Great Britain will accede to the demands of Congress. Many in the province of Canada are similarly oppressed and disenfranchised by Parliament. With the approval of Congress, Washington devises a plan to expel the British army from the forts at Montreal and Quebec and align with Canada, making Canada the fourteenth American colony. As the Northern army proceeds up the Hudson Valley to attack Montreal, Washington appoints Colonel Benedict Arnold to lead a secret mission of 1,200 men through the wilderness of Maine to attack the undermanned and vulnerable fortress at Quebec. Dr. Tamanend Maier, now on General Washingtons administrative staff, works with Benedict Arnold to plan the expedition and will accompany him to Quebec. His brother, Dr. Christian Maier, is now in Boston. He remains loyal to his king and serves as a volunteer surgeon in the beleaguered British army. General Gage is informed of the secret expedition to Quebec and sends Christian to Quebec with the information necessary to save the fortress city.

How do we know which snakes are dangerous? This seemingly simple question caused constant concern for the white settlers who colonised Australia after 1788. Facing a multitude of serpents in the bush, their fields and their homes, colonists wanted to know which were the harmful species and what to do when bitten. But who could provide this expertise? Liberally illustrated with period images, Venomous Encounters argues that much of the knowledge about which snakes were deadly was created by observing snakebite in domesticated creatures, from dogs to cattle. Originally accidental, by the middle of the nineteenth century this process became deliberate. Doctors, naturalists and amateur antidote sellers all caused snakes to bite familiar creatures in order to demonstrate the effects of venom - and the often erratic impact of 'cures'. In exploring this culture of colonial vivisection, Venomous Encounters asks fundamental questions about human-animal relationships and the nature of modern medicine.

'Writer, journalist, barrister, larrikin' Who was the first Australian novelist? John Lang, born in a Parramatta pub in 1816 with the convict ‘stain’ upon him, was a singular character. The first native-born person to have a novel published, he was also a newspaperman, a classical scholar and translator, barrister, celebrity, jailbird … enigma. He was hugely energetic, capable and original, but he also had his demons. A larrikin polymath who refused to be bound by convention, Lang didn’t just want his allotted portion – he wanted all of it. He got a lot of it, too, but not the chalice of immortality. Lang was a serial pioneer. In literature, he also wrote the first ‘detective novel’ in English, the first convict-system satire, the first Indian travelogue by an Australian, and he created the template for the bush novel. In journalism, he was the first Australian to launch and run a newspaper overseas. And in law, he was the only barrister to ever defeat the mighty East India Company in an Indian courtroom. So why have we never heard of him? This long-overdue biography explores answers to this revealing question as it tracks Lang’s rise from those humble beginnings to fortune and fleeting fame. Author Sean Doyle tells the riveting story of Lang’s remarkable life and times across three continents in the age of Empire, when the modern world was young …

Louise Wilson's third book about early convict settlers of NSW includes biographies, genealogy & local history for the Martin family of the Hawkesbury. The Martin children spread to the Sydney Metropolitan area, throughout NSW and to the Darling Downs and Maranoa Districts of Queensland.

Jacob Klund, curious about what's in his deceased grandma's attic, snoops around. He finds a trunk full of old papers. Jacob's father, a history teacher, identifies this as a great treasure because of the dates on the papers, diaries, letters, and documents. The family decides to read through them at "sharing times," after dinner. The trunk cache reveals detailed family history dating back to 1738. While immersed in the trunk's contents, the Klund family restores grandma's house and cheers for Liz, Jacob's sister, at regional and state spelling bees. They watch the civil rights movement on television and worry about the nuclear threat from the Soviets. As the 1960s begin, Allen Klund, Jacob's dad, perceives subtle changes in America's worldview and follows closely historic Supreme Court decisions that could affect his future in public education. He shares his concerns with his wife, Harriet, but he continues to teach in the system. Jacob, the novel's narrator, graduates from law school and joins a firm that handles freedom-of-religion cases. It is a step that his father hesitated to take, and he is proud of his son. Reflecting on the potential effects of Darwinism and Marxism, Jacob concludes the novel with a scathing parable called "The Project."