After graduating from Monash University in the late 1970s she worked as a printer for the underground Walker Press in Collingwood printing large format colour posters, political pamphlets, newsletters and booklets.

Her thesis examined the establishment of Australia's counter-terrorism framework and was published as Beyond Terrorism: The Development of the Australian Security State in 1993.

[9][10] In the early 1980s, Hocking wrote for the Communist Party's weekly newspaper Tribune and monthly journal Australian Left Review.

[13] Hocking has also argued that the Sydney Hilton Hotel bombing of 1978 was a false flag operation by ASIO, which sought to justify its existence in the face of possible budget cuts.

[23] As a consequence of the importance of Gough Whitlam in Australia's political history, Hocking's books about him, and featuring him, have received considerable attention from public commentators, academics and politicians.

According to the judges of the Barbara Ramsden Award, the Whitlam biography was recognised as "an unusually thorough treatment and ... a monumental project ... reminiscent of the glory days of publishing".

[24] Its quality was also highly praised: Frank Bongiorno called it "A fascinating and important account ... and a tour de force as a piece of history ...".

The book traces Murphy's life from childhood to his role in the Labor split of the 1950s, his pioneering work as a senator and reformist Attorney-General in the Whitlam government, through to his rise to the bench of the High Court, and to his untimely death, amidst controversy, in 1986.

The author argues that, in the light of September 11 and Bali, the security legislation proposed, and in part passed, by the Howard government compromises the separation of powers and individual legal and political rights.

[33]Christina Hill in the Australian Book Review describes this book as “a non-judgemental and informative life study: Hardy’s tireless political activism on behalf of the left, his work as a public figure and as a writer, his late career as a media personality, his disastrous private life (his drinking, gambling and serial adulteries) all flesh out the man and his world.” [34][35]This is Volume I of Gough Whitlam: The Biography.

The biography describes Whitlam as an extraordinary and complex man whose life was formed by the remarkable events of previous generations of his family.

This second volume chronicles the period when Gough Whitlam swept to power in the election of December 1972, becoming Australia’s twenty-first prime minister.

In the light of newly released documents and hitherto unavailable evidence this work covers the secret story of the planning, the people, and the collusion behind the removal of Gough Whitlam.