Khaki Town - Judy Nunn

Written by Judy Nunn
Read by John Derum
Format: M4B
Bitrate: 128 Kbps
Unabridged

Khaki Town
By: Judy Nunn
Narrated by: John Derum
Release date
01-10-2019
Language
English
Format
Unabridged Audiobook
Length
13 hrs and 8 mins
Publisher
Penguin Random House Australia Audio
Categories
Literature & Fiction

Set in Queensland during World War II, this breath-taking historical novel is inspired by a true wartime story that has remained a well-kept secret for over seventy years.

KHAKI TRANSFORMATION

It seems to have happened overnight, Val thought . How extraordinary. We’ve become a khaki town.

It’s March 1942. Singapore has fallen. Darwin has been bombed. Australia is on the brink of being invaded by the Imperial Japanese Forces. And Val Callahan, publican of The Brown’s Bar in Townsville, could not be happier as she contemplates the fortune she’s making from lonely, thirsty soldiers.

TOWNSVILLE’S TURMOIL

Overnight the small Queensland city is transformed into the transport hub for 70,000 American and Australian soldiers destined for combat in the South Pacific. Barbed wire and gun emplacements cover the beaches. Historic buildings are commandeered. And the dance halls are in full swing with jazz, jitterbug and jive.

CONFLICT AND INVESTIGATION

The Australian troops begrudge the confident, well-fed ‘Yanks’ who have taken over their town and their women. There’s growing conflict, too, within the American ranks, because black GIs are enjoying the absence of segregation. And the white GIs don’t like it.

As racial violence explodes through the ranks of the military, a young United States Congressman, Lyndon Baines Johnson, is sent to Townsville by his president to investigate. ‘Keep a goddamned lid on it, Lyndon,’ he is told, ‘lest it explode in our faces .’

©2019 Judy Nunn (P)2019 Penguin Random House Australia