News.

Movember 2016 Wrap Up

Once again our goons have participated in Movember by growing moustaches as a way to raise money and awareness for men’s health. Like last year these moustaches were as unique as the lads themselves ranging from very impressive to absolutely disgusting and everything in between…

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A Brief History of Seven Killings - Marlon James (2015)

A brief history of seven killings doesn’t pull any punches. Right from start James throws you in to the deep end, trying to drown you in names, places and pages and pages of near indecipherable lingo. But that’s not to say it’s unwelcoming. Centring the story on the shooting of…

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Blood Meridian - Cormac McCarthy (1985)

Blood Meridian or The Evening Redness in the West An abattoir - Dying trout – A journey – The kid – Language barriers – Whisky and whores – Liquid prose - A blood bath – The vanquished – Chaos lurking The bar is dimly lit in the fading spring light. The carcasses of butchered…

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Movember

As you may or may not know it’s Movember and it’s good to see that TGBC has a strong team this year. Movember raises awareness and funds for Men’s Health issues around the globe and gives everyone a chance to look like a fiend, improve their health through exercise, or both. If…

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Brave New World - Aldous Huxley (1932)

Aldous Huxley’s speculative Brave New World (1931) describes an efficient, peaceful and prosperous future society, seven centuries ‘after Ford’ (Henry Ford), who is revered for the efficiency and standardization he introduced to consumer society. The mass availability of material…

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The Roving Party - Rohan Wilson (2011)

Can the success of a work of fiction about the atrocities perpetrated on the aboriginal people by our early colonial forebears suggest we are coming of age in accepting that awful truth? Or might it simply be described as a “good read” and then put down? These questions quickly…

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Trout Fishing in America - Richard Brautigan (1967)

The TGBC Review of Trout Fishing in America assumed that the novel Trout Fishing in America would be about trout fishing in America, which is not neccessarily to say it isn’t. Trout Fishing in America is a bizarre and hallucinatory novel(?), that plays with ideas of language and…

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Casino Royal - Ian Fleming (1953)

Daniel Craig's James Bond was the first Bond I properly got to know. In my young mind James Bond was unreasonably handsome and effortlessly cool, but at his core was an action hero. He had more literary credibility and maturity than a John McClane, but the romantic, suave…

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Goon Profile – Greg Jenkins

Name: Greg Jenkins **Chapter: Footscray Chapter Who are you: Who am I? I’m excited by humour, wordplay and ideas. I love writing songs and poems, playing various instruments and performing it all. My Permaculture garden brings me joy and frustration and I love cycle touring…

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Launceston Chapter Founded

Not to be outdone by Hobart opening only a few months ago, we now welcome Launceston into the ever expanding TGBC community. The lads there will be meeting at the Royal Oak hotel Tough Guy Book Club is a network of monthly book clubs for men that concentrate on masculine…

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A Farewell To Arms - Ernest Hemmingway (1929)

Published in 1929 Ernest Hemmingway’s “A Farewell to Arms” is a semi-autobiographical account of the tragic love affair between American ambulance driver Frederick Henry and British nurse Catherine Barkley set against the backdrop of war torn Italy. Hemmingway uses the short…

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Hemingway Month

This time of year we read a book by Hemingway, this month it’s A Farewell To Arms. We like the guy, he’s a helluva writer, but we also like to acknowledge the faults that are clearly evident in his tough guy persona. He was a hard man who loved a fight but the sad truth is that…

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