World War II
by Michael McKernan
Australians at Home World War II
By Michael McKernan
Published by The Five Mile Press www.fivemile.com.au
RRP $34.95 in hardback
ISBN 9781760063696
Just recently I’ve noticed a trend for older books to be republished. This book was first published in 1983 as All In! Australia during the Second World War, which my late mother bought as a gift for me and it still graces my bookshelf at home.
In this latest edition, The Five Mile Press has redesigned the book although author Michael McKernan resisted the temptation to update the text, saying that it would be ‘a vastly different book if it sought to incorporate new themes’. He says he was one of the first to look at the social implications of war.
If you are of a certain age, like me, a child of the baby boom years with a father who served in the war and a mother who worked in a factory supporting the war work – in my mother’s case, she was a Sydney girl quickly snapped up for her dressmaking skills to make uniforms – this book will fill the gaps in your knowledge of what life was like and the extent to which the government’s war powers impacted everyday life. It is hard to see a cynical public today acquiescing to such draconian measures.
militarybooksaustralia.com 