South by Northwest

Granville Allen Mawer is the author of Fast Company, the biography of the clipper ship Walter Hood (Plainwords Press, 1994), Most Perfectly Safe, about the convict shipwrecks of 1833-42 (Allen & Unwin, 1997) and Ahab’s Trade, on South Sea whaling (Allen & Unwin, 1999), the last of which was shortlisted for the Queensland Premier’s History Prize 2000 and the NSW Premier’s History Prize 2001. He is a contributor to the Australia Dictionary of Biography and sometimes reviewer of maritime books for The Times Literary Supplement. His most recently published work is The Life and Legend of Jack Doolan, the Wild Colonial Boy (Mulini Press, 2004).