{"title":"Stuart Kells","description":"\u003cp\u003eStuart Kells crafts thoughtful explorations that bridge philosophy, history, and nature, offering readers a richly layered understanding of Australia’s cultural and intellectual landscape. His works delve into the evolution of ideas, society, and environment, often revealing unexpected connections between past and present.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFrom the rise of Australian department stores to reflections on libraries and environmental themes, Kells invites readers to engage with history and science through a fresh, analytical lens. His writing blends scholarly insight with narrative clarity, making complex subjects accessible and compelling.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"sold-down-the-river-by-scott-hamilton-9781922458124","title":"Sold Down the River","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTwo insiders expose the shocking and shameful betrayal of Australia's regional heartland so international bankers and traders could make a quick buck.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe Murray-Darling Basin is Australia's greatest environmental asset. The story of water in Australia is written into its ancient rivers, creeks and wetlands. It's home to more than forty Indigenous nations, and it covers an area bigger than France. It is the beating heart of our regions and sustains 40 per cent of our food production.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn 2012, Australia signed up to the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, a scheme designed to create a market for the Basin's water and to safeguard the environment.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eBut the Plan has gone horribly wrong. It has sold our farmers and rural communities down the river. It has contributed to appalling environmental damage on the planet's driest inhabited continent. It has allowed a ruthless market to form, exploited by traders who buy and sell water as if it were a currency like Bitcoin.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eScott Hamilton and Stuart Kells, both experts in public policy, have interviewed irrigators, farmers, Traditional Custodians and water traders to tell this disastrous story. In doing so, they bring to light how we have failed to protect our most precious natural resource.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eYou can't understand Australia without understanding water. \u003cem\u003eSold Down the River\u003c\/em\u003e is compulsory reading for all of us.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Penguin Random House NZ","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46342699647212,"sku":"9781922458124","price":36.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/12992363482872.jpg?v=1743935539"},{"product_id":"the-library-by-stuart-kells-9781925355994","title":"The Library","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eLibraries are filled with magic. From the Bodleian, the Folger and the Smithsonian to the fabled libraries of Middle Earth, Umberto Eco's mediaeval library labyrinth, and libraries dreamed up by John Donne, Jorge Luis Borges, and Carlos Ruiz Zafón, Stuart Kells explores the bookish places, real and fictitious, that continue to capture our imaginations.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Library: A Catalogue of Wonders\u003c\/em\u003e is a fascinating and engaging exploration of libraries as places of beauty and wonder. It's a celebration of books as objects and an account of the deeply personal nature of these hallowed spaces by one of Australia's leading bibliophiles.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Penguin Random House NZ","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46342782877932,"sku":"9781925355994","price":35.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/13885273482873.jpg?v=1743941967"},{"product_id":"mup-by-stuart-kells-9780522878097","title":"MUP","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eInside Australia's most venerable book publishing house.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eAustralia's oldest university press is also one of our best known and most trusted publishers. Founded in 1921 as a bookshop for students at the University of Melbourne, Melbourne University Press was soon publishing important works that contained the best of national scholarship.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eLandmark MUP books and series include \u003cem\u003eThe Australian Dictionary of Biography\u003c\/em\u003e, Manning Clark's \u003cem\u003eHistory of Australia\u003c\/em\u003e, \u003cem\u003eThe Encyclopaedia of New Guinea\u003c\/em\u003e, and the journal \u003cem\u003eMeanjin\u003c\/em\u003e. These and other MUP publications helped shape how Australians perceived themselves, and how they talked about literature, politics, race, the Pacific, the world wars, and public policy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eFrom its inception, MUP grappled with hard questions. How should a university press be governed? To what extent should such a press be concerned with political, polemical and radical works? And can a university press be financially self-sustaining if it focuses on books that commercial publishers overlook? The respective leaders of MUP answered these questions in ways that regularly led the press into controversy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eUsing a century of MUP publications and archives, Stuart Kells has written a rich and fascinating history of an invaluable Australian institution—one that is widely seen as public property, and whose ups and downs have always been news.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Penguin Random House NZ","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46631851589868,"sku":"9780522878097","price":63.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/3915513482374.jpg?v=1751984939"},{"product_id":"the-convent-by-stuart-kells-9780522876598","title":"The Convent","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eWhat was behind the wall and the wire? The local people knew . . . fine courtyards . . . an old swimming pool . . . dilapidated tennis courts and a remnant garden, now wild and sprawling.\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe Abbotsford Convent was this haunted place, left to languish for years after the last of the Sisters of the Good Shepherd had gone. In its prime, it had been a school, a refuge, a retreat, a workhouse, and a prison—the single largest charitable institution in the southern hemisphere.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn the late 1990s, a proposed high-density development threatened the idyllic riverside location, sparking outrage in the local community and further afield. Years of protesting, negotiating, and fundraising followed, and the convent, now on Australia's National Heritage List, has started a new life as a vibrant centre for art and culture.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eThe Convent: A City Finds its Heart\u003c\/em\u003e tells the story of the site's rich history and the efforts to preserve it. It is an uplifting tale of community activism—a tangible reminder that the magic of the past can endure and what people-power can achieve.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Penguin Random House NZ","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46656221741292,"sku":"9780522876598","price":43.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/3900523482374.jpg?v=1752476979"},{"product_id":"a-better-australia-by-scott-hamilton-9780522880878","title":"A Better Australia","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAn inside look at effective policy making, realised through hard-won public policy battles.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eWhat does successful public policy look like, and how has it been achieved in Australia? What strategies are needed to overcome petty partisanship and narrow self-interest? And who gets to decide what a \u003cem\u003ebetter Australia\u003c\/em\u003e even looks like?\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn \u003cem\u003eA Better Australia\u003c\/em\u003e, John Brumby, Scott Hamilton and Stuart Kells examine policy design, implementation and reform, and show what can be achieved when engagement is sincere and intent clear.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eLeading policymakers and political insiders - Julia Gillard, Malcolm Turnbull, Cheryl Kernot, John Hewson, Ken Wyatt, Christine Milne and more - dissect the development of successful policy in energy, gun control, natural resources taxation, disability insurance, marriage equality, gender equality in the workplace, superannuation, reproductive healthcare reform, Closing the Gap and the pandemic response.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eA Better Australia\u003c\/em\u003e takes us behind the scenes of the hard-won policy battles, showing the wide-ranging effects of good policy.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Penguin Random House NZ","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46768375464172,"sku":"9780522880878","price":48.0,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/3943323482374.jpg?v=1756375497"},{"product_id":"red-earth-by-stuart-kells-9780522879247","title":"Red Earth","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eRed Earth\u003c\/em\u003e is the remarkable history of the Mildura region – the northernmost part of Victoria. ‘Mildura’ is a Latje Latje word meaning ‘red earth’ or ‘red banks’, a reference to the intermittent stretches of red in the cliffs and banks of the Murray River near the junction with the Darling.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eBeginning with the region’s deep history, author and historian Stuart Kells unfurls the fascinating layers of this story, much of which has never been told in book form. For the first time, Kells captures the richness of the pre-colonial history, the migrant experience, the region as a tourist destination and a canvas for arts and culture – and other unique developments that shaped the region and influenced Australia and the world.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIrrigation is central to Mildura’s story, and Kells presents a new perspective on the Chaffey Brothers’ land scheme, and Alfred Deakin’s role in it. Above all, the book captures the human stories that are the backbone of the region’s history.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eRed Earth\u003c\/em\u003e is a richly illustrated landmark book, ambitious in its scope, meticulous in its methods and full of heart and human drama.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Arotahi Agency","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47000724308204,"sku":"9780522879247","price":59.99,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/11db802234efe2c95b73baeb0a239150.jpg?v=1763323522"},{"product_id":"snows-and-the-golden-age-of-australian-department-stores-by-stuart-wells-9781761452161","title":"Snow’s and the Golden Age of Australian Department Stores","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"book-description\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAround the world, the big department stores of the 1920s to the 1950s wielded great power in dictating national tastes and fashions; a visit to any of these stores was an event in itself and an important social outing.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eIn Australia, \u003cem\u003eSnow’s\u003c\/em\u003e department store was a household name. Its leaders and their families could be seen as a commercial aristocracy who socialised together, holidayed together, and collectively shaped business and industry. They were pioneers not just in retailing but in politics and other spheres – such as manufacturing, advertising, banking, heavy industry, horse racing and education. Their weddings, parties and business deals were closely watched and widely reported in the press.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eBallarat-born Sydney Snow, the eponymous founder of \u003cem\u003eSnow’s\u003c\/em\u003e, headed a retail and commercial dynasty that extended throughout Australia and maintained strong trade connections with Britain and Continental Europe. Sir Sydney’s youngest daughter, Elizabeth (Betty), married Richard Lane, one of the three brothers who founded the publishing house Penguin Books, thus entwining two families with a significant place in Australian cultural history.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003eThe story of \u003cem\u003eSnow’s\u003c\/em\u003e is evocatively told here by Sir Sydney’s granddaughter Elizabeth Lane and historian Stuart Kells in collaboration with Elizabeth’s daughter Louise Lane and art historian Fiona Kells. Lavishly illustrated with photographs from family and public archives, this beautifully designed publication is a proud tribute to the golden age of Australian department stores.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Arotahi Agency","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48244153024748,"sku":"9781761452161","price":69.99,"currency_code":"NZD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0705\/7784\/8556\/files\/9781761452161-snow-s-and-the-golden-age-of-australian-department-stores-1.jpg?v=1787993629"}],"url":"https:\/\/bookhero.live\/collections\/stuart-kells.oembed","provider":"Book Hero","version":"1.0","type":"link"}