Walkabout is a novel written by James Vance Marshall (a pseudonym for Donald G. Payne), first published in 1959 as The Children.

Two American siblings, Peter and Mary, are stranded by a gully in the Australian outback following a plane crash.

While atop a bluff, Peter thinks he has found water but Mary makes him turn away to prevent him from becoming delirious, as she knows the silver pools are the salt pans of the outback.

Suddenly, an Aboriginal teen of about Mary's age (referred to within the text as the "bush boy") appears and startles them, mostly due to his nudity.

Peter attempts to communicate with him through gestures of eating and drinking, and the bush boy quickly comes to comprehend their plight.

The bush boy misinterprets Mary's look of disgust at his nakedness as her having seen the spirit of death, and falls into a mental euthanasia.

While the children are resting, the bush boy withdraws to reflect on the situation, as this has unwittingly placed him in an ethical and moral quandary.

By the time the trio arrive at the next waterhole, the symptoms of the flu Peter has unwittingly passed on to the bush boy are beginning to show in the latter.

Peter is gathering firewood, and so to avoid interrupting a man at work, the bush boy seeks Mary, who is bathing.

In a valley rich in water, food, and wildlife, they survive for many days with the skills learned from the bush boy.