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The Nevil Shute "fan club" is an interesting phenomenon. No one is touting Shute. His work is no longer publicized; there are no articles; little in the way of biographical material except for his own autobiography (Slide Rule) which is incomplete- and a fairly mediocre biography by a Julian Smith. Nevil Shute is not discussed on talk shows and there are no recent Hollywood films based on any of this stories. Most of his titles are out-of-print in the United States.
People discover Shute on their own - seemingly average, decent people - just like the people that Shute writes about. They start reading him and then they can't stop. Then begins a quest, often taking many years, to find all of his books. Since he wrote a lot of books, it can become quite a challenge. I got my first copy of Lonely Road this year - my one and only copy.
It was inevitable therefore that Shute would become a collected author. The process of collecting his books offers just the right combination of easy/inexpensive titles gradually increasing to rare/expensive. There is also a lot of variation in American, English, Australian and other editions and some, though not great, challenges on some of the "points" of a few of his firsts. (A bibliography is badly needed and sooner or later someone will do one.)
Now is an extremely good time to start a Nevil Shute collection. Although prices have about doubled in the last few years, his titles are still relatively modest in comparison with other "hot" authors. Virtually all of his first editions, even the British ones, can still be obtained for under $100, some even for under $50 (though that won't last much longer). However, since prices are increasing about 30% per year, delay will be costly.
Since good first editions can be obtained for not much more than good hardcover reading
copies, it makes sense to acquire the firsts. In effect, it should be possible to
eventually pay for your Nevil Shute reading enjoyment!
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