Far Country [Hardcover]

Nevil Shute (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1994

Jennifer fled the drab monotony of post-war London. When she landed in Australia, it was like coming home. She loved it and when she met Carl, she had every reason to stay.

But the two of them came from quite different worlds, and it is the story of their building a life together that Nevil Shute tells in his matchless way. With warmth and understanding, and with his natural affection for the people he creates, the author brings to life his characters and the pioneer country in which they live.

"New lives for old...on a fresh, vital, expanding frontier! This is the exciting background of this heartlifting novel by a master weaver of romance and adventure." (Boston Herald)

--This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“A heart-lifting novel by a master weaver of romance and adventure.” —Boston Herald
 
“A novelist of intelligent and engaging quality, deservedly popular…. Nevil Shute was, in brief, the sort of novelist who genuinely touches the imagination and feeling.” —The Times (London) --This text refers to the Kindle Edition edition.

From the Publisher

8 1.5-hour cassettes --This text refers to the Audio Cassette edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 482 pages
• Publisher: Remploy Press; New edition edition (August 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0706610571
• ISBN-13: 978-0706610574
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,331,871 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

30 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A sweet, old-fashioned romance well worth reading., September 17, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Far Country (Hardcover)

Shute's A Town Like Alice is one of my all time favourite books so I was a bit worried that The Far Country wouldn't live up to my expectations. It did. It's a great book to curl up in bed with. It is very sweet and romantic. It tells the story of a young English woman's holiday in the Australian outback just after World War Two. She travels from a grim, rainy, poor country to the land of plenty. She soon grows to love the wild countyside of Australia and meets an older doctor who came there as a displaced person from Europe. Through their friendship they learn a lot about themselves and their adopted home.

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Classic Shute, e.g., magnificent read!, February 17, 2002

By 

Mary Well (Orangevale, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The far country (His Complete works) (Hardcover)

What a storyteller! Shute didn't live too long. I'm so glad he found time to write these human adventures along with all the other things he did. I did not realize until I read this book how bad things were in Great Britain after WWII. Makes me want to go to Australia (in the early 1950's). One of Shute's strengths is character description and development. I'm so glad I found my own copy of this book at Amazon! It was getting difficult to locate copies at the library. Why was this great story never filmed? This has to be as good as the author's A Town Like Alice and No Highway.

23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Nevil Shute is excellent in this story, beyond words!, August 13, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Far Country (Hardcover)

Jennifer Morton moves to London, temporarily, to take care of her ailing grandmother, who, before her death, speaks of times, now gone, when life was so much better in England, as though she recognizes the dissolving of a great culture, which her granddaughter will never know.
In her last day of life, she passes on the Jennifer a timely gift of money, received from her distant niece in Australia, and with it expresses her wish for Jennifer to go soon, to seek a better and new life in the opportunities offered in "The Far Country." Living up to her grandmother's words, she follows her adventuresome spirit and sails to the other side of the world for this new discovery.
Warmly received by her niece at the sheep station, she experiences the abundance of life in Queensland, where she feels at home - immediately - and can now clearly compare the differences between the continents. The new country brings refreshing contrast compared to the dreariness of her post-war nation, so plagued by needless government regulations and restrictions on all of life's commodities, even food.
Freedom is what she experiences for the first time in her life and, with it, can fully understand her grandmother's wish for her to seek it. While there, she also notices hardships, endured by others who seek alternative ways to reach this very same freedom. They are the lumberjacks - the refugees from around the globe - who have accepted two-year forestry commitments to buy into the opportunities ahead. Australia attracts them and, in return for their two years of hardship, they can gain their new beginning in their new land.
So it is with Carl Zlintner, a Chechoslovakian doctor, a World War II refugee, who has nine months to go before his own two years are finalized. He has no money and is ready to pursue life as a lumberjack in his future. However, hidden in the forest, he stumbles across the grave of a man, now dead for many years... a man with a recognizable name.
How Jennifer Morton and pursuit to learn more about this dead man bring new life to the doctor, is a moving and powerful story of willingness to endure, readiness to sacrifice and determination to reach the goals ahead.
It's a story about life and about love, wonderful and inspiring, so totally Nevil Shute!