It is the rainy season; a drunk and delirious old man lies dying in the Queensland bush. In his opium-hazed last hours, a priest finds his deserted shack and listens to his last words. Half-awake and half-dreaming the old man tells the story of an adventure set decades in the future, in a very different world…

Alan Duncan returns to his family home in Australia after the war and several years of study in England. But his homecoming is marred by the mysterious suicide of his parents' quiet and reliable parlour-maid. A search through her belongings in search of clues leads to heart-breaking revelations about the woman's identity, the death of Alan's brother Bill, and, above all, the disappearance of his brother's fiancée, Janet.

If somewhere is said to be 'beyond the black stump', it is in the deepest darkest wilds of the Australian outback. This is the sun-baked setting for Nevil Shute's novel of a romance that is tested by the differences between two young people's home lives. Stanton Laird is sent from his small town in America to work in a remote outpost in Western Australia.

When Jerry Chambers, a fresh-faced young pilot, mistakenly sinks a British submarine, he is punished with a remote posting to test an experimental new bomb; a dangerous mission far away from the girl he loves. While Jerry risks his life, his sweetheart Mona sets about clearing her lover's name... but will she be too late?

When Johnny Pascoe attempts to rescue a sick girl from the Tasmanian outback, his plane crashes, leaving him dangerously injured. Ronnie Clarke, who was trained by Pascoe, endeavours to fly a doctor in to help but this proves more difficult than he imagined.

As he waits overnight at Pascoe's house, preparing to try again the following day, Clarke revisits the past of this unusual man - and reveals the shocking and tragic secrets that have influenced his life.

When Tom Cutter hires Constantine Shaklin as an engineer in his air-freight business, he little realises the extraordinary gifts of his new recruit. Shaklin possesses a religious power which inspires everyone he meets to a new faith and hope for humanity. As Cutter’s business grows across Asia, so does Shaklin’s fame, until he is widely regarded as a unifying deity. Though he struggles to believe Shaklin is indeed divine, Cutter too finds solace in his friend’s teachings, and commits to passing on his message.

Through a series of mishaps, Henry Warren, a recently divorced City financier, ends up in hospital in a Northern town ruined by the closure of its shipyard. Moved by the fate of the town's inhabitants, Warren risks his fortune and reputation to save the shipyard and restore the town to its former prosperity. In seeking to change the fate of the town, he radically changes his own.

John Turner, a young man with a chequered past, has been told he has just one year to live. He decides to use his remaining time to search of three very different men he met briefly during the war: a snobbish British pilot, a young corporal accused of murder, and a black G.I. accused of attempted rape. Along the way, Turner learns about forgiveness, tolerance, and second chances, and overcomes his fear of death.

Young pilot Donald Ross has little in common with the Oxford don who has employed him on an expedition to the Arctic - and still less with his beautiful but stubborn daughter, Alix. But once the three of them reach the treacherous shores of Greenland, their destinies are inextricably bound by the events that unfold there.

During the Second World War, Peter Marshall's crew is one of the most successful bombing teams at their Oxfordshire airbase. However, when Peter falls in love with a young WAAF officer, his concentration begins to suffer and it looks as though his perfect run of missions - and his life - may be threatened. Nevil Shute Norway (17 January 1899 - 12 January 1960) was a popular British-Australian novelist and a successful aeronautical engineer. He studied at Balliol College, Oxford, and published his first novel, Marazan, in 1926.

Commander Malcolm Stevenson, a rich middle-aged man, finds his lonely life turned upside down when he falls in love with a pretty dance hostess. His involvement with Mollie "Sixpence" Gordon will lead to the exposure of a conspiracy to sabotage the British General Election, but Stevenson’s dogged pursuit of the criminals will throw his life and the lives of those he cares about into grave danger.

John Howard is determined to brighten up his old age by taking a fishing trip to France, but during his stay the Nazis invade. Howard must try to escape back to England with the two small children of some friends who are forced to stay behind in order to help the Allied war effort. As the conflict grows closer, the roads become impassable and Howard also comes across five more children who need his help. He ends up leading this motley group of youngsters through the French countryside, constantly beset by danger yet heroically protecting his charges.

Nevil Shute wrote this prophetic novel just before the start of the Second World War. In it he describes the devastation that results from an aerial bomb attack on Southampton that destroys the city's infrastructure and leaves the inhabitants at the mercy of cholera and further assaults. The story follows the trials and tribulations of the Corbett family as they struggle to get to safety.

Australia is one of the last places where life still exists after nuclear war starts in the Northern Hemisphere. A year on, an invisible cloak of radiation has spread almost completely around the world. Darwin is a ghost town, and radiation levels at Ayres Rock are increasing. An American nuclear-powered submarine has found its way to Australia where its captain has placed the boat under the command of the Australian Navy.

After Philip Stenning is involved in a near-fatal plane crash, he feels he owes a debt of gratitude to the man who rescued him. However, his mysterious saviour is an escaped convict, and Stenning’s determination to help leads him into a tense and dramatic adventure of intrigue, drug-running and murder. Marazan was Nevil Shute’s first published novel, and in his autobiography, Slide Rule, he recalls writing the book twice over before rewriting large portions a third time.