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» VCE books on audio » for VCE 2011

Available from Soundbooks: audiobooks of VCE titles, books (paperbacks etc.), study guides, film DVDs and more, to make VCE learning as richly informative as possible.

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VCE English/ESL and Literature Text

	Non-fiction
	Author: Colijn, Helen Title: Song of Survival (the true story on which the film “Paradise Road” is based) Media: 6CD. This version is also available as 1mp3-CD Edition length: UA (unabridged, word-for-word) Price: $79.95 (or mp3-CD edition $59.95) Narrator/Performer(s): narrated by Nadia May Rating: Helen Colijn's account of her wartime experiences is a window into a largely overlooked dimension of World War II – the imprisonment of women and children in Southeast Asia by the Japanese and how these prisoners of war responded to their dire circumstances. The conditions were harsh, terrible. Food was scarce, medicine unavailable. Held in captivity for three and a half years, more than a third of the women in Helen's camp died of disease or starvation. Yet their courage, faith, resiliency, ingenuity, and camaraderie provide us with enduring lessons on living. Though the prisoners had no musical instruments, they had their voices, and from memory scored classical works for symphony and piano. The music that helped sustain them while in captivity is a lasting and precious gift of these women to a world that has witnessed far too much war.
	Author: Drewe, Robert Title: The Shark Net Media: 7CD Edition length: UA (unabridged, word-for-word) Price: $44.95 Narrator/Performer(s): narrated by Michael Carman Rating: Aged six, Robert Drewe moved with his family from Melbourne to Perth, the world's most isolated city – and proud of it. This sun-baked coast was innocently proud, too, of its tranquillity and friendliness. Then a man he knew murdered a boy he also knew. The murderer randomly killed eight strangers - variously shooting, strangling, stabbing, bludgeoning and hacking his victims and running them down with cars - and an innocent Perth was changed forever. In the middle-class suburbs which were the killer's main stalking grounds, the mysterious murders created widespread anxiety and instant local myth. “The murders and their aftermath have both intrigued me and weighed heavily on me for three decades. To try to make sense of this time and place, and of my own childhood and adolescence, I had, finally, to write about it.” The result is The Shark Net, a vibrant and haunting memoir that reaches beyond the dark recesses of murder and chaos to encompass their ordinary suburban backdrop.
	Author: Drewe, Robert Title: The Shark Net Media: 1mp3-CD Edition length: UA (unabridged, word-for-word) Price: $29.95 Narrator/Performer(s): narrated by Michael Carman
	Author: Mazari, Najaf; Hillman, Robert Title: The Rugmaker of Mazar-e-Sharif Media: 7CD Edition length: UA (unabridged, word-for-word) Price: $109.95 Narrator/Performer(s): narrated by Humphrey Bower Rating: The Rugmaker of Mazar-e-Sharif traces an Afghani refugee's extraordinary journey – from his early life as a shepherd boy in the mountains of Northern Afghanistan, to his forced exile after being captured and tortured by the Taliban, to incarceration in an Australian detention centre... and finally, to freedom. A poignant and powerful, yet often humorous, story of suffering, injustice and survival that explores the resilience of the human spirit. Najaf's memoir gives a rare insight into what compels people to leave their homes, families and histories behind in search of peace and security for themselves and their children.
	Author: Obama, Barack Title: Dreams from my Father Media: 6CD Edition length: abridged (Please note: there is no unabridged edition) Price: $39.95 Narrator/Performer(s): narrated by the author Rating: Includes the senator's speech from the 2004 Democratic National Convention! In this lyrical, unsentimental, and compelling memoir, the son of a black African father and a white American mother searches for a workable meaning to his life as a black American. It begins in New York, where Barack Obama learns that his father – a figure he knows more as a myth than as a man – has been killed in a car accident. This sudden death inspires an emotional odyssey – first to a small town in Kansas, from which he retraces the migration of his mother's family to Hawaii, and then to Kenya, where he meets the African side of his family, confronts the bitter truth of his father's life, and at last reconciles his divided inheritance.