Leviathan; the unauthorised biography of Sydney - John Birmingham

Very much a study of Sydney's more sinister character, this is a fast-paced, funny and sometimes disturbing read. The structure is odd, defiantly non-chronological but thematically opaque, although this does allow for the odd impressive flourish. If the thesis is that Sydney's corruption is inherent in its convict camp DNA, then the segue from a punitive attack on an indigenous encampment in 1790 to a lethal police raid on an innocent aboriginal man's home in Marrickville in 1989 is a spectacular way to make your case.

Having read a fair bit about the city's earlier colonial days I was most educated by more recent events such as the jaw-dropping police corruption of the 1970s and a brief section on the hapless and hopeless anti-immigration parties of the 1980s, from which this typically in-your-face sentence comes:

"When Whitehouse blew him away, Bovver was wearing a singlet bearing the message: Say No To the New Gun Control Laws."

Arf!