Bluebird and the Dead Lake

Bluebird and the Dead Lake is that supreme rarity—a story of heroism that is frank about its hero, and a true report of events which reads like a thrilling adventure story. A salt lake in the dead heart of the South Australian desert, an aborigine's curse, a wife who has to watch her husband risk his life day after day, the memory of a crash nobody mentions and nobody forgets, and a last chance to snatch a record after nine years of disaster: these might be the ingredients of a novel. In fact they form the background to the actual drama of Donald Campbell's successful fight for the land speed record at Lake Eyre in July 1964. The truth behind Campbell's extraordinary victory is much more than the history of a record bid. It is the story of a man and his obsession, and John Pearson gives an eyewitness account of the fear, the tensions, the heartbreak and the suspicions that grew behind the scenes as Campbell pursued his dream of speed on a track which seemed to spell certain death. The portrait of Campbell is candid and extraordinarily revealing. It shows a man struggling against his own weaknesses and immense hazards, to achieve one of the most remarkable records of all time.