British Author Challenge February 2026: Elizabeth Chadwick & Nevil Shute

Elizabeth Chadwick writes historical fiction, much of it set in the 12th century. I chose her because I enjoy historical fiction and the time period about which she writes.

Wikipedia page

Selected works
William Marshall series
Ravenstow series
Eleanor of Aquitaine series
The Champion
The Love Knot
First Knight
Daughters of the Grail
The Winter Mantle

Nevil Shute was suggested by @avatiakh and chosen by popular acclaim. I'm embarrassed to say he's another author I've never read before.

Wikipedia page

Works on Gutenberg Canada (You'll need to scroll down a bit to get to Shute.)

Works on Faded Page

Selected works
A Town Like Alice
On the Beach
Pastoral
The Far Country
Requiem for a Wren
The Chequer Board
Pied Piper
In the Wet

Whohoo! I am ordering my copy of A Town Like Alice tomorrow and hoping it’ll be available for pickup on either Thursday or Friday (going on a work trip next week and the plan is to bring it with me.

>2 amanda4242: I am hoping to fit in at least 3 of Shute's books: On the Beach (one of my favorites of his!), along with The Far Country and Trustee from the Toolroom, both of which I have never read.

>4 alcottacre: Seems like you’ll have a great February, Stasia!

>3 PawsforThought: I downloaded that one from Faded Page and hope to start it next week. I was going to get it from the library, but my library, which has scores of branches across multiple counties, has exactly one copy...and it's in mending.

>4 alcottacre: Ambitious!

I've lined up a few of Nevil Shute's books that I haven't read as yet and will hopefully finish at least one.
Trustee from a Toolroom, Requiem for a Wren & The Chequer Board.
I'm also looking at Shadows and Strongholds by Elizabeth Chadwick.

>8 avatiakh: I have Chadwick's The Champion and her novelization of First Knight on the shelves, so I'll probably be reading one of those.

I absolutely love A Town Like Alice, which I've read several times - I highly recommend it. Trustee From the Toolroom (the last work published before his death) is a charming novel in which Shute has no axe to grind. I wasn't planning to reread it, but I may be talking myself into it, especially since several others are planning to.

I'm planning to choose from: Pied Piper, The Far Country, Pastoral, So Distained, Beyond the Black Stump, and No Highway. I doubt I'll get to all of them, but the first two are pretty certain.

I've been avoiding On the Beach for years, because I'm afraid it's too bleak. And Beyond the Black Stump is supposed to be from his anti-American era, and I'm not certain I need any more reminding of the failures of the United States right now.

I am exceited to hear what everyone thinks of their choices!

>5 PawsforThought: Thanks, Paws. Nevil Shute is a favorite of mine and I have read several of his books.

>7 amanda4242: We will see if I can pull it off, lol.

>10 Dejah_Thoris: I am with you on A Town Like Alice, Dejah. I have read it at least twice. Glad to hear the good words about Trustee from the Toolroom. I will be adding it to one of the TIOLI challenges, I am sure. I have already put the other two books into TIOLI Challenge #7.

>11 alcottacre: I'll watch for wherever you put it! And I've already joined you in Challenge #7 for The Far Country. :)

I’m glad to hear such positive words about A Town Like Alice. Boding well for my reading month.

>10 Dejah_Thoris: I hope you like Pied Piper as much as I remember liking it!

>12 Dejah_Thoris: I am waiting to see how things shake out before committing Trustee from the Toolroom to one specifically. It would certainly go in Kerry's Challenge #10: Read a book originally published in a Commonwealth of Nations country. We shall see!

>14 alcottacre: I recall an excellent miniseries of 'A Town Called Alice' with Bryan Brown in the lead, from many years ago. The DVD is available from Amazon, but I don't know about streaming.

>15 ffortsa: I remember that too. It was really good. It ran on PBS. I don't know where it might be available now. I have not yet read the book. If I have time in February, I'll try to fit it in, but I may not have a lot of reading time that month. As it is, I only got a notification from the library today that my hold on Watership Down for the January challenge has finally come in. So I'm already behind.

>15 ffortsa: & >16 atozgrl: It's on youtube.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

I am planning on reading Most Secret in Feb. From 1945.

>17 amanda4242: I'm a teenager of the 80s (and an Aussie) so I loved watching these miniseries. The Battlers is another great one, All The Rivers Run, The Thorn Birds of course, Sara Dane, The Harp in the South, The Shiralee, I Can Jump Puddles, Nancy Wake, so many more. More recently, Seachange - love David Wenham.
The 80s were the era of television miniseries in Australia. Call me old fashioned, but I loved that you had to wait for the next instalment - built up the atmosphere as you thought all week about the last episode. I tend to forget too much watching lots of episodes in a row.

>19 JayneCM: I have a deep love of The Thorn Birds.

I'm not big on having to wait for an episode, but I must confess that I think a lot of pre-streaming stuff is far superior; they *had* to make stuff good to get people to tune in again next week.

>19 JayneCM: My wife and I were big fans of Sigrid Thornton and enjoyed many of the Aussie miniseries.

>15 ffortsa: That's OK, Judy. I so very rarely watch movies any more that it is not funny. I stick to the books, lol.

I finished Trustee from the Toolroom yesterday, a welcome read that was highly enjoyable.

>23 avatiakh: I'm so glad you liked it!

I've finished Pied Piper, and while it's not A Town Like Alice, I enjoyed it very much. I basically read it in one sitting, lol.

>21 RBeffa: Isn't she wonderful? I have loved her since The Man From Snowy River. She has been in so many iconic Aussie shows and movies. It makes me want to start a watching marathon of all her works!

I will be reading Lady of the English by Elizabeth Chadwick. I tried to access Pied Piper from my library but it is in the stack collection and not available for borrowing.

>25 JayneCM: That sounds like a great time. She is a terrific actress.

Meanwhile, Most Secret has been put on pause by me and I am instead enjoying the 1939ish What Happened To The Corbetts. (It happens to be a 99cent kindle read on Amazon.)

I see lots of good choices this month. Going to look for A Town called Alice.

I finished Trustee from the Toolroom this afternoon. My thoughts on it:

Trustee from the Toolroom by Nevil Shute - Nevil Shute is (seemingly) one of the few authors I had heard of prior to LT. My favorite book of his is On the Beach, which I love and is probably more of a sentimental favorite that anything, so I was very happy to see him proposed as one of the authors for this month's British Authors Challenge. Trustee from the Toolroom is what I would call a 'feel good' read. It has a main character, Keith, who is someone that the reader can really care for - he is just your average man, a man who gave up work that he hated in a factory, to work on his hobby and write about, little realizing the impact that his hobby has on people around the world. Keith is married to Katie, who works in a shop to help support the two of them, so that Keith can continue to pursue after his hobby. Into their lives drops Janice, their niece, who comes to live with them after her parents, Keith's sister and her husband, are killed in a hurricane as they were sailing in the Pacific. There is never a question as to whether Keith and Katie will take Janice - she is family and he is a stand up guy who would never shirk his responsibility; however, it appears that the inheritance that Janice was to have had was on her parents' yacht, now abandoned on an island in the Pacific and Keith means to go and get it for her. I had a great time with this book - I guess it would be called 'old-fashioned' these days because no one is out to get anyone, there are a bunch of good people in it and not dastardly ones - and it all comes down to believing that people like Keith exist - people who are just everyday people trying to live their lives and do the right thing; Recommended (4.25 stars) Mine

"Keith took the report and thrust it deep into the pocket of his greasy overcoat. 'I don't want you to think I don't appreciate everything you've done, sir,' he said. 'But there's one thing sticking out like a sore thumb, and that's that I'm the trustee. I don't want to do things in a hurry.' "

>28 EllaTim: I finished A Town like Alice. Overall I liked it, I thought it well written, I enjoyed the voice of the old solicitor who is telling the story. I also felt that it’s very much a story of it’s time. Bad things have happened, but now we are looking forward. Most apparent in the last part, that is focused on building. This town like Alice. I confess I did find this part less interesting.

>29 alcottacre: Lovely review of Trustee From the Toolroom, Stasia!

I've just finshed The Far Country which takes a look at the austerity of postwar England versus the growing prosperity of 1950s Australia.

Now I've also read Nevil Shute's The Chequer Board. These are easy reads.

>31 Dejah_Thoris: Thanks, Dejah!

>32 avatiakh: I just finished up my read of The Far Country too, Kerry. While I enjoyed the book, I thought it was a pleasant read, nothing earth shattering about it.

I re-read A Town Like Alice. Oh my word!

>34 alcottacre: I have to agree, but nice to have these reads alongside more challenging ones.

The March thread is up!

https://www.librarything.com/topic/379015

Well, it's the last day of February and my hold on A Town Like Alice still hasn't come in. I guess I'll have to read Shute in March. *sigh*

I did read Elizabeth Chadwick's novelization of First Knight. She's really good at describing setting and action sequences. The dialog's a little clonky sometimes, but that's not her fault. Reading it reminded me that the movie's biggest problem is casting; why anyone thought Richard Gere should play Lancelot is beyond me.

I just finished my third and final Nevil Shute book for February, On the Beach. I still love it - not just for the book itself, but the fact that it makes me think. If I knew for absolute sure that I only had 6 months left to live, what would I do?

I ended up reading three Nevil Shute novels in February, to add to the two I'd previously read and, sadly, I found one of his works that I really didn't like.

Pied Piper takes the top spot of the three, followed by The Far Country, which I enjoyed. Then came What Happened to the Corbetts. It's a work of speculative fiction which Shute hoped would warn the British of the peril of what he correctly saw as the bombing of Great Britain by 'enemies.' Some things he got right, but other, fortunately, he got very wrong. He also grossly underestimated the determination and strength that got the nation through the Blitz.

But these weren't the problem with the book - I just didn't like the Corbetts. There was one particular action that the adult Corbetts took that I found horrifying and never got past. I preferred their lower class neighbors down the street - those two would have made for a much more interesting book.

Still, Shute is batting .800 for me.

>40 Dejah_Thoris: I have not yet read What Happened to the Corbetts, so Shute is still batting a thousand for me :) I am sure that I will get to that one eventually. I am sorry it was not a better read for you, Dejah!

>40 Dejah_Thoris: Pied Piper is one of my favorite Shute novels. I read Most Secret which I was not crazy about. I have not finished What Happened To The Corbetts. Like you, I don't like the Corbetts. I like the neighbors!

I stalled on Requiem for a Wren but had already read 3 Shute novels for the challenge. I'll finish it over the next few weeks. Disappointed that I didn't manage to start Chadwick's The Champion.

I finished Requiem for a Wren, fairly sad read so I took some breaks with it.

>44 avatiakh: I have not yet read that one. I will have to see if I can find a copy of it.

I'm still waiting for the library to send A Town Like Alice; I may have to just buy it.

>45 alcottacre: I hope you can get to it in the end.

>46 amanda4242: Hope it turns up. I read it years ago and don't need to reread.

I *finally* got a copy of A Town Like Alice! I was visiting a friend in Montana and found it in a used bookstore we went to.