There has been many attempts to bring Robyn Davidson's adventure memoir to the big screen. Over the years both Julia Roberts and Nicole Kidman have been attached to the lead role. Development on the movie adaptation began before lead actress Mia Wasikowska was even born.
The book Rick is reading in the car at the end of the movie is Robert A. Heinlein's "Tunnel in the Sky" - about a group of people trying to live on an desolated, uninhabited planet.