The amazing true story of a family forced to flee Russia after falling out with the most powerful men in the country, and forced into hiding on one of the last frontiers of the remote Australian outback.
Venerated skin surgeon Professor Fiona Wood, the inventor of spay-on skin for serious burns victims and the saviour of so many lives after the Bali bombing, reveals her personal and professional battles to end up a world-leading innovator.
Australian medical icon Dr Catherine Hamlin travels to Ethiopia and sets up a hospital for women who’ve sustained terrible injuries in childbirth, and ends up training a local peasant woman, Mamitu Gashe, to become a world-leading surgeon.
Dianne O’Brien was taken from her Aboriginal birth mother and grew up believing she was Irish, like her adoptive parents. But when the only mother she’d ever known died, she was cast aside and endured rape, horrific domestic violence, alcohol addiction and cruel betrayal before recovering her fighting spirit and becoming a community leader.
Navy diver Paul de Gelder was attacked by a bull shark while on a training exercise in Sydney’s harbour, losing a hand and part of one leg. But nothing could take his spirit.
Teenager Alyssa Azar became obsessed with the idea of climbing Everest and pursued her dream despite tremendous obstacles and difficulties, all the time drawing inspiration from others who’d tried, and the mountain itself.
Melbourne’s Father Bob Maguire was a man of passion, creativity and enormous humour. Part angry Old Testament prophet, part compassionate Mother Teresa and part comedian Billy Connolly, his is a story that challenged all conventions.
This is the story of the much admired priest Father Chris Riley who grew up with the dream of helping Australia’s forgotten streetkids, and then dedicated his life to giving them a second chance through his Youth Off The Streets foundation.
When the 2003 Boxing Day tsunami hit Asia, Father Chris Riley saw the footage of children who had lost their parents in the deluge and immediately went over to Indonesia’s Banda Aceh, along with some of his streetkids, to set up the first tented orphanages in the country.
When top British cop Peter Ryan came to Australia to take charge of the NSW Police in 1996 – at one stage described as the most corrupt police force in the world – he knew it was going to be a tough job. But he had no idea how devastating it would prove.
