Round the Bend (novel) Round the Bend (novel) Round the Bend is a 1951 novel by Nevil Shute. It tells the story of Constantine "Connie" Shaklin, an aircraft engineer who founds a new religion transcending existing religions based on the merit of good work. It deals with racism, including the White Australia policy, and also with the importance of private enterprise. It was one of the first novels Shute wrote after emigrating from Britain to Australia in 1950. The novel, written in the first person, adopts the voice and eyes of Tom Cutter, an aircraft pilot, engineer, and entrepreneur. The novel starts with Cutter's
Sophia Alice Callahan which was at the time Indian Territory. Callahan wrote in a romantic novel style but she also clearly intended what has been called a "reform novel," identifying many wrongs suffered by Native Americans in United States society. After being discovered in the late 20th century, the novel was reprinted in 1997. It has been the subject of scholarly studies. Sophia Alice Callahan was born in Sulphur Springs, Texas in 1868, to a father who was culturally Muscogee and mixed-race, with Creek and European ancestry; and a white mother, daughter of a Methodist missionary. Her father, Samuel Benton Callahan, was one-eighth