J. E. MACDONNELL is the author of best-selling novels dealing with men at sea. One of his greatest creations is the character of Jim Brady, whose career begins in Jim Brady - Leading Seaman, a narrative of absorbing strength and depth which helped establish the author as one of Australia's finest and consistently entertaining story tellers.

This series promises to follow Jim Brady's career from his boyhood in a Queensland bush town to the quarterdeck. Jim is a ready-fisted, virile young barbarian destined for the bridge of a destroyer at the very least.

All eight of Brady's adventures are being made available in digital form for the very first time.

JIM BRADY - LEADING SEAMAN

When we first meet Jim Brady he's a poor, good-looking, brown-skinned outdoors boy with his head screwed on the right way, and with no apparent scruples about the weaker sex; the warrior's relaxation.

At 14 or 15 he's being initiated into the facts of life by the local nympho, at 17 he celebrates his first grown up dance by unselfconsciously attempting, to tumble the first nice, girl he's taken home.

He joins the Royal Australian Navy as a raw recruit. And, from the way he preens himself on the passenger ship taking him to Malta to join his first cruiser, the reader is left no doubt that he is going to be as successful in the deck cabin as in the gun turret.

"Mr. Macdonnell displays a gift for vivid narrative that might have made him an outstanding war correspondent if he had not happened to be a sea officer." (TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT)

Published September 16, 2025. Recommended Price: £2.50