Australia’s most irresponsible historian is back with a collection of stories celebrating the quirks of one of the strangest places in the world.
100 Weirdest Tales from Across Australia, from comedy writer Ben Pobjie, delves deep into our country’s past and present to serve up the most unnerving and downright bizarre stories that will make you the king of wacky trivia knowledge.
It’s hard to say why Australia turned out so strange. Maybe it’s because, although home to the oldest continuing culture on Earth, it was colonised quite recently by an unstable mixture of petty criminals and drunken policemen, none of whom actually wanted to be there and all of whom were inappropriately dressed for the weather.
From fish falling out of the sky, joggers relieving themselves on your doorstep and mysterious monsters springing from the shadows to giant fruit, disappearing ships and ill-conceived toast spreads, these are just some of the things you can expect on any given day in our surreal southern land.
“Australia’s weirdness isn’t only pervasive and compelling, it’s also quintessentially Australian, as well as being greatly underrated,” said Pobjie. “Too many people don’t realise just how weird Australia is, and that’s a shame – because daily life in this country is far richer and more vivid when you have an understanding of how bizarre the country, culture and history that surround us truly is.”
Told with Pobjie’s trademark flair and brutally funny wit, 100 Weirdest Tales from Across Australia will leave you smacking your gob with one hand while scratching your head with the other.
Ben Pobjie is the author of 100 Tales from Australia’s Most Haunted Places, Error Australis, Mad Dogs and Thunderbolts and Second Best, as well as countless articles about TV, sport, politics and the meaning of life scattered throughout the Australian media landscape. He lives in Sydney, where he spends his days panicking about deadlines.
100 Weirdest Tales from Across Australia is published by Affirm Press and is available from all leading book retailers including QBD Books.
Image: 100 Weirdest Tales from Across Australia – courtesy of Affirm Press