Beyond the Black Stump [Paperback]

Nevil Shute (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2000

Stanton Laird, a young American geologist with a secret, comes to the Australian outback to search for oil. There he meets an unconventional farming family and falls in love with their Mollie Regan. However cultural differences between Stanton’s and Mollie’s worlds force the two lovers to make difficult decisions.

Editorial Reviews

Review

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 A brilliantly descriptive writer, a master of suspense David Holloway --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Nevil Shute Norway was born in London and worked as an aeronautical engineer at Vickers before setting up his own airship company. Worried that his reputation as a fiction writer would damage his engineering career, he wrote without using his surname. He served in both world wars and was a commander in the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve in World War II, working on secret projects. After the war he became a full time author completing a fictionalised account of his war time experience in 'Most Secret'. Moving to Australia in 1949 he based seven of his novels against that background including his most successful title On The Beach. This was subsequently a hugely successful film starring Gregory Peck, Antony Perkins and Ava Gardner and became arguably the major after the bomb movie of all time. Shute became one of the top selling authors of the 50s and 60s with wide appeal to a broad international market attracted by strong story lines which were always meticulously researched..

Product Details

• Paperback: 302 pages
• Publisher: House of Stratus Ltd (January 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 184232246X
• ISBN-13: 978-1842322468
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,738,448 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Nevil Shute Norway was born in 1899 in Ealing, London. He studied Engineering Science at Balliol College, Oxford. Following his childhood passion, he entered the fledgling aircraft industry as an aeronautical engineer working to develop airships and, later, airplanes. In his spare time he began writing and he published his first novel, Marazan, in 1926, using the name Nevil Shute to protect his engineering career. In 1931 he married Frances Mary Heaton and they had 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 in 1960. His most celebrated novels include Pied Piper (1942), A Town Like Alice (1950), and On the Beach (1957).

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Beyond the black stump, November 28, 2001

By 

Katrina Vogt (South Australia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Beyond the Black Stump (Hardcover)

The gentle and very English urbanity of Nevil Shute comes through strongly in this work. It is obvious he likes Australia and is not exactly rapt in the US.
His characters, similar to many of the others he has used, vary from the earthy but wise Irishmen who run the station, to the brash yet sensitive young Americans who come to work the oil rig. Central to it all is Shute's archetypal heroine, the English/Australian lass brimming with common sense who gets the heart of the good man...in the end. In the process, our heroine discovers there is more to materialism than meets the eye.
Shute writes lovingly of the Austraian outback, and knowledgeably of airline travel in the fifties. Although his writing is detailed, it is never dull, and he weaves a believable web.
I have most of Shute's work and consider this one of his best; though what an American would think of it is open to question! Buy it and find out.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great book!, October 1, 2008

By 

Mac (Germany) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This is one of the best books I have ever read! The writing is typical Scute, excellent! An American geologist drilling for oil in the outback of Australia meets Molly and is captivated by her. Molly's large multiracial family adds color and humor, as well as a great deal of common sense. Molly is intrigued by the American's camp equipment and all things American. Life in the "Lunatic" is very different from Stan's small town in Oregon but he comes to accept a different way of life. This book is a window into the past in outback Australia and small town America. I strongly recommend this wonderful book.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Good story, characterizations, May 10, 2001

By 

James P. Hunt (Oklahoma City, OK USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Beyond the Black Stump (Audio Cassette)

The story of an American man (Stan Laird) who falls in love with a Western Australian girl (Mollie) in the 1950s, but how their cultures can't really allow them to stay together. I'm not so sure I agree with the idea that the theme was materialism vs. spiritualism. For me, it was more, perhaps, the idea that civilization comes with a price tag. That while it can and will bring nicer material things and formal marriage etc, it can also detract from the human spirit as well. The Americans Mollie meets must maintain a certain amount of hypocrisy, apparently, to cope with life. But as Mollie wisely perceives, they shouldn't be judged too harsly for that because civilization has made things more convenient for them, both physically and emotionally. I liked very much her (Schute's) perception that the Americans of 1955 Oregon probably wouldn't welcome the Oregon settlers of 1890 in their homes because, like the contemporary outback Australians, they'd find them too coarse and vulgar.

Schute is a remarkable writer. Traditional, I suppose, but compassionate and insightful. His women characters are very well drawn and, unquestionably, the wisest, toughest and the most admirable ones in the book. Although I found it hard to sypathize with Stan Laird because he seemed like kind of a philistine, Schute showed empathy for him too. A good read.