During World War I, Nevil made several attempts to join the Royal Flying Corp (later renamed the Royal Air Force), though he was rejected, very likely as a result of his increase in stuttering due to the pressures of work and war strain. In August of 1918, Nevil joined the infantry and was posted at the Isle of Grain, located on the Thames. Fortunately the war ended shortly thereafter, on November 11, 1918.
Upon graduating from Balliol College in January of 1923, Nevil began working for the well known aircraft manufacturer, de Havilland. With the money earned in his new job, he purchased a typewriter, and began writing. Nevil decided against using his full name as the author of his novels, settling on his first and middle names, Nevil Shute, out of concern that his stories could cast some negative reflection on the professionalism of his engineering career by his colleagues. After six months at de Havilland, he presented his first completed novel, Stephen Morris, to publishers, but was rejected three times. Likewise, his second novel, Pilotage, received the same fate, which led him to shelf both.
He left his position with de Havilland in 1924, to work for Vickers Ltd, a company working on the R-100 airship project, as the Chief Calculator. During this time there was a general consensus that airships could become the best alternative for transporting passengers across the oceans, and that airplanes would not provide the same level of success for this need. Nevil wrote and completed Marazan, during the planning stages of the R-100, prior to the beginning of its construction. To him, writing provided a welcome diversion from his normal work schedule, and he found that it helped to clear his mind for the following work day. Marazan was published in 1926, and followed by So Disdained in 1928. In 1929, the R-100 was completed. Several tests were performed, and its final test voyage was a successful round trip flight from Cardington, England to Montreal, Quebec in Canada, which concluded on August 16, 1930. Less than two months later, the R101, an airship project in development by the British government, crashed during flight, resulting in only 6 of 54 passengers surviving. This disaster led to the end of the airship projects in England, and the R-100 was sold for scrap.
During the years of 1930 through 1931, Nevil traveled throughout England, in an effort to recruit investors to buy shares of a new aircraft manufacturing company he would successfully develop, called Airspeed Limited. It was during this time that he started writing his third published novel, Lonely Road, which turned out to be a commercial success, and his first story to become a motion picture.
In 1931, Nevil married Frances Heaton, a doctor on the staff of York Hospital, whom he would remain with throughout his life. Seven years later, his book Ruined City (entitled Kindling in the U.S.) was published, followed by Ordeal (What Happened to the Corbetts in England) in 1939, which was selected as a Book of the Month Club selection, providing him even greater notoriety in America. Many more books were to follow.
Nevil and James Riddell left for a six month trip to Australia in September of 1948. It was during this trip that Nevil developed much of the storyline for one of his most popular novels, A Town Like Alice. In Australia, Shute and Riddell had the opportunity to visit with Mr. and Mrs. Geysel-Vonick, who had both been captured by the Japanese in 1942 during the war. For two and a half years, Mrs. Geysel-Vonick was forced to walk over 2000 kilometers (1200 miles) with her 6 month baby in hand. This meeting contributed to the development of the character of Jean Paget in A Town Like Alice, titled The Legacy in America. The six month trip to Australia also created a love for the country, which resulted in his immigration in 1952, when his family settled in Langwarrin, thirty miles south of Melbourne.
Slide Rule, his autobiography encompassing his years through 1938, was published in 1954. In later years, he had planned to write a sequel entitled Set Square, but regretfully, it wasn't to occur.
His most popular novel, On the Beach, a story of the results of nuclear devastation, was published in 1957, and was a huge commercial success, later becoming a movie starring the blockbuster stars of that era, Gregory Peck and Ava Gardner.
On January 12, 1960, soon after completing his novel, Trustee From the Toolroom, while working at his typewriter on a new novel that he planned to entitle Incident at Eucla, Nevil had a heart attack and was taken to a hospital where he died that evening.
During his career Nevil Shute wrote 25 books that were published. Some of his stories carried different titles in the U.S. from his publications in England, a few were printed posthumously. Most of his earliest titles were printed and targeted for the British and the U.S. markets, but it wasn't long before his books were also published in Canada and Australia, with several other countries following as his base of readers steadily grew.
Approximately 50 years after his death, his stories remain popular, and sometimes required reading in high schools and universities. On the Beach and A Town Like Alice are considered by many to be classics. Three of his novels are listed on The Modern Library's Reader's List of the 100 best novels written in English since 1900, a list created from a poll taken in 1998.
Always the modest gentleman, Nevil Shute never considered himself a great writer, nevertheless he was one of the most popular authors of his generation, and is still considered as the consummate storyteller.
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