Steve Shanahan has narrated 7 audiobooks on Listento.it by 7 authors, with an average listener rating of 4.5★ across 2 ratings. The most-rated is Bet Your Life.
Bet Your Life
Summary
Adventure into the Australian outback with Kelso Hunnicutt who has bet he can dodge the police for the next week. A partner who frames him for murder. A beautiful wife who double-crosses him. An innocent bet that could cost him his life. A compelling thriller about a man and a woman who will stop at nothing to get what they want...and the man trapped between them.
©1992 Evan Green (P)2019 Bolinda Publishing
Jack Maggs
Summary
A thrilling story of mesmerism and possession, of dangerous bargains and illicit love.
London, 1837.
Jack Maggs, raised and deported as a criminal, has returned from Australia in secret and at great risk. What does he want after all these years, and why is he so interested in the comings and goings at a plush townhouse in Great Queen Street? And why is Jack himself an object of such interest to Tobias Oates, celebrated author, amateur hypnotist and fellow burglar - in this case of people’s minds, of their histories and inner phantoms?
Winner of the Commonwealth Writers' Prize and the Miles Franklin Award, Peter Carey's Jack Maggs is dazzlingly entertaining.
©1997 Peter Carey (P)2019 Bolinda Publishing
The Better Son
Summary
Tasmania. 1952. The greens hills near Mole Creek hide a dark labyrinthine underworld of caves. They are dangerous and forbidden to children. But this is Tasmania — an island at the end of the earth. Here, rules are made to be broken. For two young brothers, a hidden cave a short walk from the family farm seems the perfect escape from their abusive, shell-shocked father — until the older brother goes missing. Fearful of his father, nine-year-old Kip lies about what happened. It is a decision that will haunt him for the rest of his life. Fifty years later, Kip has a young son of his own, but cannot look at him without seeing his lost brother, Tommy. On a mission of atonement, he returns to the cave they called Kubla to discover if it’s ever too late to set things right. To have a second chance. To be the father he never had.
©2016 Katherine Johnson (P)2019 W. F. Howes Ltd
Secret and Special
Summary
Soon after the declaration of war on Japan, a secret military reconnaissance unit was established, based on the British Special Operations Executive (known as SOE) and called the Inter-allied Services Department. The unit was tasked with the role to "obtain and report information of the enemy...weaken the enemy by sabotage and destruction of morale and to lend aid and assistance to local efforts to the same end in enemy occupied territories." In 1943 it became known under the cover name Special Reconnaissance Department (SRD) and included some British officers who had escaped from Singapore. After arriving in Australia, they assembled in Melbourne, forming the nucleus of ISD and, together with some Australians, established what became the Z Special Unit. Training began in a number of locations around Australia including on Fraser Island off the Queensland coast, In Broken Bay near Sydney, at Careening Bay in Western Australia, at the 'House on the Hill' in Cairns and at East Arm near Darwin. From these training areas and bases, Z Special undertook intelligence gathering and raiding missions throughout Southeast Asia including New Guinea, Singapore, Timor, Malaya, Borneo, Vietnam and the Dutch East Indies. The first operation was Jaywick in September 1943, led by a 28-year-old officer from the Gordon Highlanders, Captain Ivan Lyon. Using an old Japanese fishing boat renamed Krait this captured vessel was re-fitted and provisioned for a voyage from Australia to just south of Singapore, where it released six commandos in three folding kayaks to attack Japanese shipping in the harbour. They placed limpet mines on several Japanese ships, sinking 40,000 tons of shipping. After the successful attack, they paddled south, were picked up by the Krait and successfully returned to Australia. This was followed by Operation Rimau, again led by Lyon, but this time things went very wrong very early. Identified, they made a fighting withdrawal but all of the raiding party were shot or captured, with the last 10 being executed just before the end of the war. Important in Z Special operations were a number of vessels designated 'snake boats'. Four 66' modified trawlers were constructed as well as a range of Asian vessels that allowed their operation in South East Asian areas of operation. One Z Special, the last in PNG, set out on the night of the 11 April 1945. Eight operatives were landed on the Japanese held island of Muschu about five kilometres off the coast near Wewak to determine the status of two 140mm Japanese naval guns that had been placed there. These guns would prove dangerous to planned naval landings at Wewak, and allied command needed to know if these were operational. The operatives were launched in four double folding kayaks from a HTML fast crash boat, but the current carried them away from their landing position and the surf capsized their boats. The men swam ashore but both their radio and their signal torches had been destroyed, and the men had no way of connecting with the return crash boat. Soon their lost equipment was found by the Japanese and a massive search with 1,000 troops scoured the island. Quite soon seven of the eight men had been captured, killed or died trying to swim to the mainland and only one man, Sergeant 'Mick' Dennis remained. Over the next three days he continued a one man war, fighting off Japanese patrols and living off the land. Unable to do this for long, he took to the dangerous shark and crocodile infested waters, and with the aid of a log, paddled to the mainland. Landing on a Japanese controlled beach, he snuck ashore and after further firefights and a difficult journey travelling west, he finally was found by an Australian patrol. Mick Dennis was able to provide valuable information and for his service and bravery, he was awarded a Military Medal. During the course of the war, Z Special Unit carried out 81 covert operations in the Southwest Pacific theatre. While the unit was disbanded after the end of the war, many of its techniques would be modified and used by Australian Special Forces to this day. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
©2021 Will Davies (P)2021 Penguin Random House Australia
Australia's Dambusters
Summary
A truly comprehensive account of 617 Squadron RAF, who carried out one of the most dangerous and audacious aerial bombing raids of World War II. It was the evening of 16 May 1943, as 19 modified Lancaster bombers from 617 Squadron RAF, under the command of youthful Wing Commander Guy Gibson, roared into the night sky from their Lincolnshire base. They were on a top-secret Bomber Command mission, codenamed Operation Chastise, now regarded as one of the most dangerous and audacious bombing raids of World War II - an attack on the formidable, well-defended dams of Germany’s Ruhr Valley. Slung beneath the belly of each aircraft was one of the war’s greatest secrets - a bouncing bomb. Against the odds, and flying straight and level into the teeth of terrifying enemy fire, they succeeded in breaching the two principal dams. Many of the 133 airmen involved that fateful night hailed from Australia, and several would be counted among the 56 who would not return to base next morning. The Dams Raid led to the men of this gallant company - often referred to as a suicide squadron - taking on even more hazardous operations in the final two years of the war. Under valorous leadership, and now armed with massive Tallboy and Grand Slam "earthquake" bombs, they obliterated vital Nazi installations, destroying such defiant targets as the heavily-defended Kembs Barrage and the German battleship, Tirpitz, often at a terrible cost in lives. First published in 2003, this deeply researched, revised and updated edition of Australia’s Dambusters offers a truly comprehensive account of the most famous bombing raid of the war through the words and stories of the courageous Australian airmen and others who flew on this and later perilous missions, remembered and forever immortalized as The Dambusters.
©2021 Colin Burgess (P)2021 Simon & Schuster Audio
The Diggers of Colditz
Summary
Colditz Castle was Nazi Germany’s infamous "escape-proof" wartime prison, where hundreds of the most determined and resourceful Allied prisoners were sent. Despite having more guards than inmates, Australian Lieutenant Jack Champ and other prisoners tirelessly carried out their campaign to escape from the massive floodlit stronghold, by any means necessary.
In this riveting account - by turns humorous, heartfelt, and tragic - historian Colin Burgess and Lieutenant Jack Champ, from the point of view of the prisoners themselves, tell the story of the 20 Australians who made this castle their "home", and the plans they made that were so crazy that some even achieved the seemingly impossible - escape!
"A stirring testimony of mateship.... We are often on tenterhooks, always impressed by their determination, industry and courage." (Australian Book Review)
©1985, 1997, 2019 Jack Champ and Colin Burgess (P)2019 Simon & Schuster Australia. All rights reserved.
The Battles for Kokoda Plateau
Summary
"The Japanese attacked us, they mortared us, they shelled us...they did everything." On 21 July 1942, a large Japanese reconnaissance mission landed along the north-eastern coastline of Papua. It would soon turn into an all-out attempt to capture Port Morseby. This is the powerful story of the three weeks of battle by a small Australian militia force, the 39th Battalion, supported by the 1st Papua Infantry Battalion and the Royal Papuan Constabulary, to keep the Japanese at bay. Outnumbered by at least three to one, they fought courageously to hold the Kokoda Plateau - the gateway to the Owen Stanleys. Desperately short of ammunition and food and stranded in the fetid swamps and lowland jungles, they did everything they could to keep the Kokoda airstrip out of Japanese hands. Not far away, and desperately trying to reach the Australians, were two groups of Anglican missionaries trapped behind enemy lines. With each passing day the parties grew, joined by lost Australian soldiers and downed American airmen. Theirs is a story of tragedy and betrayal. Using letters, diaries and other firsthand accounts, from friend and foe alike, leading military historian David W Cameron has for the first time written a detailed, compelling and provocative account of what occurred at the northern foot of the Owen Stanleys in late July and early August 1942. These are stories that deserve to be firmly embedded into the Kokoda legend.
©2020 David W. Cameron (P)2020 W. F. Howes