Jacqueline Kent

Australia’s crusaders for women’s voting rights and the radical feminists of the 1970s changed lives across the country and around the globe. But what about the generation in between? Throughout the twentieth century, a group of trailblazing women writers challenged the nation’s status quo. Miles Franklin’s forceful voice invigorated the emerging women’s movement, Mary Gilmore was a groundbreaking feminist journalist, and novelists Katharine Susannah Prichard and Eleanor Dark explored the colonial displacement of Australia’s Indigenous people. Kylie Tennant spoke up for battlers during the Depression. Dymphna Cusack, Katharine Susannah Prichard and Dorothy Hewett, all members of Australia’s Communist Party, advocated for social reform. Ruth Park’s The Harp in the South jolted the NSW government into developing slum clearance programs. And the work of First Nations poet and activist Kath Walker (later Oodgeroo Noonuccal) was crucial in achieving constitutional reform for Indigenous peoples. Acclaimed biographer Jacqueline Kent traces these women’s stories, shaped by the seismic social and political events of their time, and illuminates their immense courage and principled determination to change the world.

The glittering story of April Ashley, model and trans pioneer, and the divorce case that gripped 1970s Britain and defined transgender rights for a generation. As Britain emerged from post-war austerity and headed towards the Swinging Sixties, no one embodied its newfound spirit of hedonism and glamour like April Ashley. A fashion model and socialite who rose from poverty in Liverpool to the heights of London society via Le Carrousel nightclub in Paris, she was also one of the first Britons to undergo gender-affirming surgery. Ashley was appointed MBE for services to transgender equality in 2012, but her journey towards acceptance was hard-won and bitterly contested. In 1961, a friend sold her story to a tabloid and she feared that she would never work in the UK again. Her brief marriage to Arthur Corbett, the son of a baron, set off a high-profile divorce battle, resulting in a landmark 1970 decision denying transgender women legal status as women — and denying Ashley her husband’s inheritance. Instead, she blazed her own trail, rubbing shoulders along the way with the bohemians and jetsetters who had risen to prominence in the Swinging Sixties. Drawing on a wide variety of sources, award-winning biographers Jacqueline Kent and Tom Roberts tell the full story of April Ashley’s extraordinary life at the vanguard of the sexual revolution and the movement for trans equality.

Ladies - have you reached that time in your life, when you finally wake up and realise that you have been living on auto-pilot, overlooking your own needs for far too long? The feeling of contentment evades you often, because you have lost your sense of 'self' along the way. Who are you now and what is driving you forward every day? You've probably ticked many of the success boxes - a family, a nice home, a steady job - so why are you still seeking something more and feeling empty inside? It's time to turn the focus on YOU, so you can say 'I've got this 'This handy manual enables you to live a heartfelt life, where you can draw on the inspiration of real-life experiences of love, loss and overcoming adversity, All of the stories are combined with a range of practical and versatile self-help tools that not only calm the mind but soothe the soul, whilst regaining your inner power. You've Got This teaches you how to implement small, manageable steps towards nurturing your physical, emotional, mental or spiritual wellbeing - reclaiming the life that you would ask for if a magic wand was waved over you. In sharing elements of her personal story, Jacqueline shows how you can flip the script, choosing yourself first, and find the inner-strength to successfully navigate whatever challenges life throws at you. Her unique 'glass-half-full' attitude will have you believing that anything is possible when you know how. Just try it for yourself and see It's time to see what you can doWhen you feel there's nothing left. Whether you're feeling lost, or down on your luckOr maybe you're feeling bereft. There's always something you can try, It might be something small. But if you keep trying, one day at a time, You'll find the answer in no time at all. Keep going, I believe in you - You've got this

Beatrice Davis, 1909-1992, was general editor at Angus and Robertson the main Australian publishing company from 1937 to 1973. There she discovered and published such writers as Thea Astley, Miles Franklin, Patricia Wrightson, Xavier Herbert and Hal Porter becoming a literary tastemaker in the process. A central figure in Australian literature – ‘respected, feared, courted and berated.’ Originally published to great acclaim in 2001, A Certain Style introduced this stylish and formidable woman to thousands of readers and told a history of books and publishing in twentieth-century Australia. This reissue has a new introduction and updates throughout as the author presents a compelling account of a contradictory woman and her times. Author Jacqueline Kent won the 2002 National Biography Award and the Nita B Kibble Award for A Certain Style, first published by Viking. Reissue has a new introduction reflecting on more recent publishing developments – onscreen editing, corporate mergers etc – that contrast with the highly masculine, pen-and-ink world Beatrice worked in. Jacquie is now a well-known journalist and excellent media performer. Her book The Making of Julia Gillard received a huge amount of coverage. A Certain Style will be a great companion to other classic nonfiction NewSouth has put back into print, including books by Henry Reynolds and Anne Summers. The name Beatrice Davis has currency because Australian Publishers’ Association runs a prestigious editorial fellowship named after her. Beatrice Davis was a judge of the Miles Franklin award from its inception and the last judge to have been appointed by Miles Franklin herself.