On the Beach

By: Nevil Shute

Narrated by: James Smillie

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. Commander Dwight Towers and his Australian liaison officer are sent to the coast of North America to discover whether a stray radio signal originating from near Seattle is a sign of life.

©2009 The Trustees of the Estate of the late Nevil Shute Norway (P)2014 Audible, Inc.

Last humans on Earrh

If you’re into this genre, this is one of the must-reads. Not as classic as Earth Abides, but worth your time.

Performance: Narrator was too slow. I set for 1.25 speed, which helped. It’s Australian accent and language, so I couldn’t go 1.5x.

Depression Hurts

This book could send you right over the edge... WOW. What a hopeless story. Umm, I just couldn't understand why these people, given like a whole year to prepare, couldn't use all of the resources they had to build an underground shelter to house as many people as possible. They had plenty of time to come up with a decent system of underground living area that could have given them a fighting chance to survive as many years as possible trying to wait out the nuclear winter.

Nuclear War Classic

On the Beach, written by Nevil Shute and published in 1957 is a somber post apocalyptic novel that follows survivors in Australia after a nuclear war and subsequent radioactive fallout has contaminated most of the world. Much of the story revolves around an American nuclear submarine, the last of the US Navy, docked in Melbourne and under the command of Captain Dwight Towers. The post apocalyptic world has been contaminated with high levels of radiation stemming from the use of cobalt bombs by the Russian and Chinese military forces. This story is character driven, focusing on the struggle for people to maintain some sense of purpose in spite of their doom. It was slightly disappointing that most of the people in On the Beach basically give up and passively accept death. Why didn’t they attempt to create a shelter in which some people could survive until the levels of radioactivity decreased? (scientists mention several times that the radioactive cobalt has a 5-10 year half-life) Released at the height of the Cold War, On the Beach has elements of a warning or cautionary tale and is clearly written with some political intentions in mind. While On the Beach is a well written novel that explores some important ideas worthy of consideration, it is slow-paced and uneventful at times. If you are looking for excitement and entertainment you may want to look at some other reading options.

Classic apocalyptic

This is simply a classic and well written. Not as brutal as The Road, but still powerful as the people can do nothing but wait and find ways to fill their remaining days with distraction. I've read this and now listened to it a couple more times and it has aged well. One of the early apocalyptic novels, and one of the best. No zombies, no ridiculous shoot em up stuff, just realism.

What could have been.

An almost true story about the aftermath of the very brief WWIII (due to the inclusion of nukes). Considering how one man prevented this from happening during the Cuban Missile Crisis, this story is quite realistic. It lets you look into the psychology of people who have the luxury/curse of knowing the date of their death because of the upcoming nuclear fallout. It gives them fear while also letting them truly live. It's an interesting concept to observe as you wonder just how you would live if you knew when you were going to die. Nevil Shute pulls no punches as this is a very sad story overall.

Be warned however that unless you find the subject matter fascinating you may not greatly enjoy this. It can be a little depressing and there isn't much excitement in the story. It is more about observing how ordinary people in Australia live knowing they will soon be dead because of a war they did not want.