21 h 41 minAudiobook6 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What does survival demand when science, engineering, and mystery meet on an island?
The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne brings survival, science, and engineering into an adventure shaped by discovery. The central question is concrete and compelling: how can knowledge help sustain life? Here, the desire to understand belongs alongside the need to survive.
This is an invitation to follow both danger and ideas. Verne’s story joins adventure with science fiction, making room for the pleasure of discovery as well as the tension of survival. The island’s mystery gives that combination an added pull.
What you’ll discover
- Survival at the center Explore a story where staying alive gives science and engineering an urgent purpose.
- Science meets adventure Follow the meeting of scientific ideas and the demands of a survival story.
- Engineering with a purpose Consider engineering through the concrete stakes of survival, rather than as an abstract subject.
- The pull of mystery Let the promise of an island mystery draw you toward discovery.
- Discovery drives curiosity Find an adventure that makes the wish to understand part of its appeal.
Who will love it
Readers who love survival tales, clever inventions, and mysteries that build with a steady hand. It suits anyone curious about science and engineering, and anyone who enjoys watching a small, loyal team turn bare land into a home.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A Storm Balloon Carries Five Escapers
- Fire Becomes Their First Great Problem
- Climbing the Mountain Gives Them a Map
- Knowledge Turns Clay into Civilization
- Patience, Seasons, and One Grain of Corn
- Strange Gifts and a Wild Stranger
- Pirates Arrive and the Sea Strikes Back
- Ayrton Vanishes and Herbert Fights for Life
- What the Island Is Really About
Who’s who
- Cyrus HardingA Massachusetts engineer and Union officer who leads the colony with science, calm judgment, and a firm belief that every problem has a solution.
- Gideon SpilettA New York Herald reporter, brave and quick-witted, who records the island's story and proves surprisingly handy with tools and a rifle.
- PencroftA tough, warm-hearted sailor who hatched the escape plan, loves the island, and longs most of all for a boat and a pipe of tobacco.
- Herbert BrownAn orphan boy of fifteen, eager for natural history, whose knowledge of plants and animals helps the settlers find food and remedies.
- NebHarding's devoted servant, a freed man of great strength and cheer, who serves as cook and refuses to believe his master is lost.
- TopHarding's loyal dog, whose sharp nose and strange behavior lead the settlers toward both rescue and mystery.
- AyrtonA solitary man found alone on a distant islet, haunted by guilt, who longs to prove he can be trusted and live honestly again.
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- Large print hardcover
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25 languages, side by side
The Mysterious Island in 25 languages, side by side, paragraph by paragraph, once the book texts are online: the way to learn a language with a book you love.
The Mysterious Island
by Jules Verne · 1874
Five prisoners flee a besieged city in a storm balloon and crash on an unmapped Pacific island with nothing.
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In short
Five men and a dog fall from the sky onto an island that appears on no map. It is March 1865, and they have escaped a besieged Confederate city in a storm balloon.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A Storm Balloon Carries Five Escapers
In March 1865 a hurricane drives a leaking balloon across the Pacific. The passengers throw out guns, food, and even pocketknives to stay aloft. They are Union prisoners who fled Richmond by stealing the balloon on a night of wind and sleet.
They are Captain Cyrus Harding, an engineer, the reporter Gideon Spilett, the servant Neb, the sailor Pencroft, and the orphan Herbert. Harding's dog Top leaps aboard at the last moment.
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What is The Mysterious Island about?
Five Union prisoners escape the siege of Richmond in a balloon and are blown across the Pacific to an uncharted island. Led by engineer Cyrus Harding, they build a colony from nothing while unexplained events keep helping them.
Is The Mysterious Island connected to other Jules Verne books?
Yes. The novel links to two other Verne stories. Its castaway Ayrton comes from Captain Grant's Children, and the island's secret ties to Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea. Each book also stands on its own.
Is The Mysterious Island a true story?
No. Verne wrote it as fiction, published in the 1870s. The American Civil War setting, the science, and the many practical methods are drawn from real knowledge of his time.
The author
Jules Verne
1828–1905 · French adventure novelist
Jules Verne was a French writer born in Nantes in 1828. He lived in Paris and later in Amiens, where he died in 1905. His novels include Journey to the Centre of the Earth (1864), Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea (1870), and Around the World in Eighty Days (1873).
More by Jules Verne
All 23 booksMore like this
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