BOOKSHELF – Vetaffairs August 2025
Selling the Mirage – Mission Impossible?
By Richard Bomball (AVM Retired)

This “brief episode in the life of a General Duties Air Force Pilot Air Vice-Marshal Richard J. Bomball AO, AFC (RAAF, Retired)” is in fact a detailed account of the day-to-day activities of the team which successfully negotiated Australia’s first major international arms export: the sale of the RAAF’s retired Mirage fleet to Pakistan. The account covers the hurried preparation, development of negotiating strategies, and the events, some quite unexpected, that led to the finally agreed price and schedule of payments, as well as the intense period of contract negotiations.
- Pages: 80
- Cost: $27.65 plus postage outside of Canberra
- To Buy: http://www.bytespublishing.com.au/
A Photographer’s Guide: The Great Ocean Road & Otways
By Samantha Ohlsen

Discover this definitive guide for photographers by Army veteran Samantha Ohlsen, featuring 152 shoot locations from across the Great Ocean Road and Otways region. Whether you are a seasoned photographer or an enthusiastic beginner, this book will equip you with everything you need to capture your best shots. The book will save you countless hours of research to avoid missed opportunities and provide the chance to learn insights from an expert who spent more than 3 years mastering the region.
- Pages: 750
- Cost: $39 (e-book), $89 (hardcover)
- To Buy: www.samanthaohlsenphotography.com.au
The Douglas Boston in RAAF Service – No. 22 Squadron 1942–1944
By Michael Claringbould

This volume presents the most detailed history to date of the Douglas Boston light bomber in RAAF Pacific service. Unusually just one unit, No. 22 Squadron, operated the type in New Guinea throughout late 1942 to mid-1944 where it flew daring low-level attack missions, before advancing to the Netherlands East Indies.
- Pages: 148
- Cost: $39.95
- To Buy: avonmorebooks.com.au
Military Observer: Diary of a Middle East Peacekeeper
By Allan A Murray

Allan Murray offers observations upon an Arab Muslim society (Syria) and the Jewish state of Israel, Observer service on the quiet Golan Heights and the more hectic and dangerous Israeli Controlled Area of southern Lebanon. He also details dodging landmines, roadside bombs, indiscriminate shelling, armed and occasionally irate belligerents, air attacks, Katyusha rockets and tank fire. Australians have been exposed to this cocktail in the endless conflicts around Israel since the 1950s. This is a story of the background, the experience, the belligerents and the United Nations from one Australian Observer’s perspective in the early 1990s.
- Pages: 186
- Cost: $4.99 (ebook) $31.99 (paperback) US$31.99 (hardcover)
- To Buy: Amazon
Japan’s Final Surrender
By Michael P. Grant

The Fall of Singapore was the catalyst for some of the worst atrocities perpetrated by the Japanese on Allied forces. This is a concise history of Japanese brutality that commenced on the Manchurian Peninsula leading to attacks on British and French colonies in the Far East. Highlighted are the major roles played by the Australian military which conducted surrender ceremonies at Borneo, Morotai, Balikpapan, and Papua New Guinea in a fine monograph that reminds us of the surrender that took place in Tokyo Bay eight decades ago.
- Pages: 77
- Cost: $20 + postage
- To Buy: garnettm@bigpond.net.au
Valiant Hearts – a novel from the true WWI story of the Jones family
By Sue Sacchero

Sue Sacchero describes her work as faction: part fact and part fiction, involving the experiences of her great-grandmother’s family during the Great War. Extensive research, foggy childhood memories, family legend, and poetic licence coalesce in a far-reaching yarn that it is both ordinary and extraordinary. Australian inventiveness, joy, heartbreak, naivety, gallantry, courage and sheer endurance punctuate reports of horrific battles at Gallipoli, Fromelles, Pozieres, in Belgium and along the Western Front. The account is completed by heart-wrenching service in war hospitals in England and France and casualty clearing stations close to the front, as well as the tragic impact on the home front.
- Pages: 420
- Cost: $6.99 (e-book), $33.00 (paperback), $30.00 (signed copy from author) plus postage
- To Buy: Amazon or suesacchero@icloud.com
Invisible Scars Somalia
By Frank Kovacs

This is the true story of an Australian soldier living with the effects of PTSD who, together with 2 British military personnel, was seconded by the US to join a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) special agent and an Ethiopian female warrior to infiltrate to Luuq, a rural town and staging area for Al-Shabaab rebels in Central Somalia, on a clandestine mission. Their secret and urgent mission was to observe the movement of rebel forces, their equipment and ammunition, then report back directly to CIA headquarters at Langley.
- Pages: 484
- Cost: $39.00
- To Buy: Amazon
Sustaining the Fight
By Russ Morison

This is a story of the quiet, unsung heroes of the Vietnam War who left behind family, home and a population who were not all behind them to help bring about peace in that troubled land called Vietnam. They did their job well and the results are plain to see now 50 years later. This book reflects on the service of some 2,000 Royal Australian Army Service Corps men who served in Corps units, and the Australian Army Training Team Vietnam. It contains many personal stories and extracts from Par Oneri – Corps journals, and other material by those who served in that conflict.
- Pages: 250
- Cost: $37.00 plus postage
- To Buy: dabblers3@gmail.com or call 0408 947 935