Other editions of book On the Beach

The story is set primarily in and around Melbourne, Australia, in 1963. World War III has devastated most of the populated world, polluting the atmosphere with nuclear fallout, and killing all human and animal life in the Northern Hemisphere. The war began with a nuclear attack by Albania on Italy, and then escalated with the bombing of the United States and the United Kingdom by Egypt. Because the aircraft used in these attacks were obtained from the Soviet Union, the Soviets were mistakenly blamed, triggering a retaliatory strike on the Soviet Union by NATO.There is also an attack by the Soviets on the People's Republic of China, which may have been a response to a Chinese attack aimed at occupying Soviet industrial areas near the Chinese border. Most, if not all, of the bombs included cobalt to enhance their radioactive properties.Global air currents are slowly carrying the lethal nuclear fallout across the Intertropical Convergence Zone, to the Southern Hemisphere. The only parts of the planet still habitable are Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and the southern parts of South America, although they are slowly succumbing to radiation poisoning as well. Life in Melbourne continues reasonably normally, although the near-complete lack of motor fuels makes traveling difficult.People in Australia detect a mysterious and incomprehensible Morse code radio signal originating from the American city of Seattle, Washington. With hope that someone has survived in the contaminated regions, one of the last American nuclear submarines, USS Scorpion, placed by its captain, Commander Dwight Towers, under Australian naval command, is ordered to sail north from its port of refuge in Melbourne (Australia's southernmost major mainland city) to contact whomever is sending the signal. In preparation for this journey, the submarine makes a shorter trip to port cities in northern Australia, including Cairns, Queensland and Darwin, Northern Territory; no survivors are found. Two Australians sail with the American crew: Lieutenant Commander Peter Holmes, naval liaison officer to the Americans, and a scientist, Professor John Osborne.

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.

"The most shocking fiction I have read in years. What is shocking about it is both the idea and the sheer imaginative brilliance with which Mr. Shute brings it off."THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLEThey are the last generation, the innocent victims of an accidental war, living out their last days, making do with what they have, hoping for a miracle. As the deadly rain moves ever closer, the world as we know it winds toward an inevitable end....

Following the war, a radioactive cloud begins to sweep southwards poisoning everything in its path. An American submarine captain is among the survivors left sheltering in Australia, preparing with the locals for the inevitable. Despite his memories of his wife, he becomes close to a young woman struggling to accept the harsh realities of their situation. Then a Morse code signal is picked up and the submarine must set sail through the bleak ocean to search for signs of life.

On the Beach is a 1957 post-apocalyptic novel written by British-Australian author Nevil Shute after he emigrated to Australia. The novel details the experiences of a mixed group of people in Melbourne as they await the arrival of deadly radiation spreading towards them from the northern hemisphere following a nuclear war a year previously. As the radiation approaches each person deals with their impending death in different ways.--Wikipedia.

Set in Melbourne following a catastrophic war in the northern hemisphere, Nevil Shute’s classic is the story of a handful of survivors in the terrifying aftermath of nuclear apocalypse. First published in 1957―and famously adapted for the screen soon after by Stanley Kramer, in a film starring Gregory Peck and Ava Gardner―On the Beach is the perhaps the greatest work of popular fiction about the end of the world.