Beyond the Black Stump

Nevil Shute was born on 17 January 1899 in Ealing, London. After attending the Dragon School and Shrewsbury School, he studied Engineering Science at Balliol College, Oxford. He worked as an aeronautical engineer and published his first novel, Marazan, in 1926. In 1931 he married Frances Mary Heaton and they went on to have two daughters. During the Second World War he joined the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve where he worked on developing secret weapons. After the war he continued to write and settled in Australia where he lived until his death on 12 January 1960. His most celebrated novels include Pied Piper (1942), No Highway (1948), A Town Like Alice (1950) and On the Beach (1957).

"The novel fascinates in its record of the hazards and joys shared by a rich and rewarding company of personalities" Scotsman "The best novel its author has written for some time...his characters...are carved out with fine bold strokes, and the red dust of his million-acre ranch fairly gets in your throat" Daily Telegraph "That shattering, unaffected, literary style of his is wholly deceptive...is, in fact, masterly" -- H.E. Bates "A brilliantly descriptive writer, a master of suspense" David Holloway