New Guinea

One American soldier called it "a green hell on Earth". Monsoon-soaked wilderness, debilitating heat, impassable mountains, torrential rivers, and disease-infested swamps - New Guinea was a battleground far more deadly than the most fanatical of enemy troops. Japanese forces numbering some 600,000 men began landing in January 1942, determined to seize the island as a cornerstone of the empire's strategy to knock Australia out of the war.

Follow the antics of Clyde & Neville as they annoy friends and battle enemies, on water, in the air and deep in the jungles of the South Pacific during W.W. II, where they never lose their sense of humor- fighting the enemy or searching for the perfect beer. They are simple plantation owners on a South Seas Island before being chased off by the Japanese. They volunteer as Coast Watchers, working behind enemy lines. Problems occur, many of their own making and dog them as they confound both the Japanese and the Allies. Never having learned to put up with bureaucrats they go about their work,...

Auckland Island is a godforsaken place in the middle of the Southern Ocean, 285 miles south of New Zealand. With year-round freezing rain and howling winds, it is one of the most forbidding places in the world. To be shipwrecked there means almost certain death. In 1864, Captain Thomas Musgrave and his crew of four aboard the schooner Grafton wreck on the southern end of the island. Utterly alone in a dense coastal forest, plagued by stinging blowflies and relentless rain, Captain Musgrave inspires his men to take action.

When a mysterious client asks former Delta Force operator Case Lee to investigate a massive New Guinea gold discovery, the job quickly unravels into an incredible world of spies, terrorists, and tribal headhunters. Case, with a sense he's being played, walks away from the entire mess. Until life-threatening events pull him back in. This time, he's not taking any prisoners.

Abelard Hassam di Chirico Flint - Abel, for short - is a rich and silly mouse. He spends most of his days just having fun, going to picnics with his wife, playing croquet with friends, and dancing at parties. Unlike most other mice, Abel has never had to work for anything. All that changes one blustery fall day when his wife’s scarf flutters away in a gust of wind. Abel races off to rescue it and is swept away in a rainstorm. When the storm is over, Abel finds himself washed up a deserted island.

In Walking with Ghosts in Papua New Guinea, Antonson shares a journey of physical and mental endurance in his inimitable way, in the company of a mixed band of resolute adventurers, blending fascinating historical context with the tribulations of unexpected discoveries in faraway lands.

Powerfully written by Australia's leading military historian, Saving Port Moresby commemorates the 80th Anniversary of the Battles in New Guinea. Japanese Major General Horii Tomitarō, commanding the South Seas Force, was tasked, after taking Kokoda Plateau in late July, with entering the Owen Stanley Range to capture Port Morseby. After the battles for Deniki and Isurava, his troops were pushing south through the mountains. The Australians under Brigadier Arnold Potts, however, were not in route, but were involved in a determined fighting withdraw.

New Guinea became the site of one of the World War II's most savage campaigns. Despite their lack of jungle training, the 32nd Division's Ghost Mountain Boys were assigned the most grueling mission of the entire Pacific campaign: to march 130 miles over rugged mountains and to protect the right flank of the Australian army as they fought to push the Japanese back to the village of Buna.

Within 24 hours of the Japanese invasion of Northern New Guinea at Gona in July 1942, the Australian militiamen of ‘B’ Company, 39th Battalion, spent four weeks fighting a delaying action against a crack Japanese force outnumbered by three to one. By mid-August, the rest of the battalion had arrived, and these men took up a position at Isurava, in the heart of the cloud-covered mountains and jungles of the Owen Stanley Range. The battle for Isurava would be the defining battle of the Kokoda Campaign and has rightfully been described as Australia’s Thermopylae.

While the Marine Corps island-hopped across the Pacific from Guadalcanal to Saipan to Iwo Jima, the U.S. Army was locked in a grueling, multiyear fight for the jungle island of New Guinea, which in Japanese hands threatened both Australia and the vital supply lines stretching to the United States. Forces under Douglas MacArthur intended to deny the Japanese this opportunity and use New Guinea as a stepping stone on the road back to the Philippines and, beyond it, Japan.

Renowned linguistic anthropologist Don Kulick first went to study the tiny jungle village of Gapun in New Guinea over 30 years ago to document how it was that their native language, Tayap, was dying. But you can't study a language without settling in among the people, understanding how they speak every day, and even more, how they live. This book takes us inside the village as Kulick came to know it, revealing what it is like to live in a difficult-to-get-to village of 200 people, carved out like a cleft in the middle of a swamp, in the middle of a tropical rainforest.

The tiny ex-mercenary company Alto Group struggled to get recognition for their six engine heavy transport aircraft (built to an "acquired" design) at their Northern Michigan factory by delivering F4F Wildcat fighters and two M-3 Stuart tanks to Wake Island after December 7th. Answering a call from a man they only met once, they mount a new mission to give logistical support to battered remnants of USAAF Far Eastern forces that have retreated to Australia and New Guinea.Using close air support tricks they learned fighting in South America in the Gran Chao War, they support the troops ...

In 1979, the idea of an oral history based project on the administration of Papua New Guinea germinated at the ABC, driven by Tim Bowden and Daniel Connell. This massive undertaking involved the recording of 350 hours of tape recorded interviews with Australians and Papua New Guineans who had been involved with Australia's colonial administration which ended with self government and independence in 1975.

During WWII, the spring/summer of 1942 bore little good news for the Allies. The Japanese Army steamrolled south, poising at the doorstep of Australia. In a surprising turn that lifts the Allied spirits and captures the American press, U.S. Marines land and hold Guadalcanal despite a brutal onslaught of fresh Japanese forces. For the first time, the press reported, the enemy stopped. But at the same time an elite 6,000 man Japanese assault force lands a few hundred miles away on New Guinea, racing up an incredibly rugged and steep trail high into the mountains known as the Kakoda Track. ...

She was a perfect baby, and she had a perfect name. Chrysanthemum. When she was old enough to appreciate it, Chrysanthemum loved her name. And then she started school. "I'm named after my grandmother," said Victoria. "You're named after a flower." Chrysanthemum wilted. Life at school didn't improve. In fact, it got worse. Then the students were introduced to their music teacher, Mrs. Twinkle. Mrs. Delphinium Twinkle. And suddenly, Chrysanthemum blossomed...

From August 7th 1942 until February 24th 1944, the US Navy fought the most difficult campaign in its history. Between the landing of the 1st Marine Division on Guadalcanal and the final withdrawal of the Imperial Japanese Navy from its main South Pacific base at Rabaul, the US Navy suffered such high personnel losses that for years it refused to publicly release total casualty figures.

This is a fictionalized version of my late father's World War Two memoirs. It begins in the twenty-fifth century when a mischievous young woman inadvertently travels back in time with her 'toys' of the future. This tale is included in the anthology "Willful Women II". My most memorable experience about this story occurred when an elderly gentleman at a book fair saw the photo my father had taken from a mountaintop of numerous wartime ships gathering in a South Pacific staging area for battle. He excitedly exclaimed, "That's my ship, the U.S.S. West Virginia is one of the ships in this photo...

Valentine's day is the story of Amelia, a young girl living in Sydney, Australia in the years following World War II. In her flight from her father, Valentine, and his compulsive gambling, Amelia finds employment in the oddest places, working for a cough syrup magnate who wants to be a magician, an airline that selects stewardesses for their legs, and an executive whose company has forgotten his existence. Her misadventures lead her to a remote island where a normal day includes mice in the rice and lizards in her cleavage. There she finds what she takes for true love. But as the story ...

Tom Chance knows he must survive before he can save others. How did it get to this? He came to this isolated outpost on Australia's wild Cape York to put himself back together, to lie low for a while. And it was going so well. A great job, new friends, and maybe even a shot at a relationship. But when a young Aboriginal man disappears his instincts won't let him ignore it. And it's not long before his past comes to visit, courtesy of a hard man in a black jeep.

Mole discovers his pants and shirts have holes in them. Turns out, moths have made holes in Mole's clothes. So Mouse does what a good friend should do and takes Mole to the store. The latest adventure of Mouse and Mole shows that sometimes it's fun to try something new - and sometimes it isn't