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Binding: MP3 CDDewey Decimal Number: 994.02 EAN: 9781400152919 Edition: MP3 Una Format: Audiobook, CD, MP3 Audio, Unabridged ISBN: 1400152917 Label: Tantor Media Manufacturer: Tantor Media Number Of Items: 2 Publication Date: November 01, 2006 Publisher: Tantor Media Studio: Tantor Media Editorial Review: Product Description: With the authority of a renowned historian and the narrative grace of a brilliant novelist, Thomas Keneally offers an insider's perspective into the dramatic saga of the birth of a vibrant society in an unfamiliar land. A Commonwealth of Thieves immerses us in the fledgling penal colony and conjures up colorful scenes of the joy and heartbreak, the thrills and hardships that characterized those first four improbable years. The result is a lively and engrossing work of history, as well as a tale of redemption for the thousands of convicts who started new lives thousands of miles from their homes.. Average Rating:
 Rating:  - An excellent introduction to a fascinating bit of historyTom Keneally's The Commonwealth of Thieves is an excellent read, well researched and written in a smooth and economical style that gives the reader a thorough introduction to the early history of the Botany Bay settlement. My sole complaint is that it essentially ends in 1793 with the return of Captain Phillip, the colony's first governor, to Britain, the colony having after much difficulty and doubt finally become a viable settlement. Keneally's style is so engaging and the events so intriguing ... Read More Rating: - Excellent review of the start of AustraliaThis book provides an excellent and detailed feel for what life must have ben like for the early settlers of Australia and the environment from which they came. It is difficult to imagine how anybody survived those early days and the hardships they had to put up with. Rating:  - Excellent introductionKeneally has produced a fascinating introduction to the foundation of Australia, a fantastic mix of the high politics and the fascinating lives of the first settlers and their complex relationship with the Aboriginal peoples. Rating: - A Not So Holy BeginningRobert Hughes,'Fatal Shore' redressed? Not quite. Hughes's well-honed invective sits uneasily besides Keneally's pragmatic prose. Keneally extolls the virtuous outcome of Australia's first governor, Arthur Phillip's benevolent authority, and his establishment, against all odds of Australia's criminal society. Whereas Hughes feels troubled by these origins, Keneally, the ongoing grief of the indigenous inhabitants apart, senses triumph. The writing does not wear its research excessively, and the ... Read More Rating: - Most interesting "history lesson"The author of Schindler's List brings us his 37th book, a history of the four years during which white Australia was born. Thomas Keneally competes with Robert Hughes' epic history of Australia's origin that covers a span of 80 years, chronicling the white settlers as oppressive. But Keneally's fresh, novelistic history has found its own place in Australian historiography; it scrutinizes a short time period, providing a multifaceted and profound study of the historical characters that birthed Australia. ... Read More |
