When I was a kid this was a favorite story. But that was then.

The translator of this edition has attempted to make the story accessible to a new generation of readers. At first this didn’t bother me. It just made the reading go faster. But after some time I found I was relating to the characters in a distinctly 21st Century way, and that was NOT a good thing.

The characters have no feeling at all for their environment. They rape & pillage it with supreme abandon secure in the false knowledge that they are the Crown of Creation and all Nature exists to serve them and their needs (even their vices: tobacco turns up and addicts them all). In addition the preoccupations of White Males (there are no women at all in the story) are taken for granted while Blacks and Orangutans (and dogs) are equated as equals. Worse: the one black man actually WANTS to be a servant (if not slave) to the Alpha Male.

I’m certainly not one who thinks that all history should be rewritten to suit my prejudices BUT…I do admit that I find older translations easier to take. Somehow it seems that the preoccupations and beliefs of bygone times and places are more understandable (not to mention a better read) couched in their own syntax. ( )

Summary: Five passengers in a balloon are caught in a hurricane over the Pacific in 1865 and trown onto the coast of an unknown island. This is the story of their adventures.

The adventure novel written by Jules Verne depicting the survival techniques employed by ordinary men who beat back nature and held themselves in semblances of civilization reminiscent of a world they had lost. However climatic and enticing, this page-turner’s plot was woefully boring unlike many of Verne’s other books.
The exploits of Cyrus Harding and the other men on Lincoln Island were sheer, unadulterated adventure yet achievable by any other men placed on the same island with naught but companions. That was perhaps the underlying intrigue of the book to me as I have spent many an hour contemplating the means I would need to accomplish to survive in the wilderness.
Ultimately, I was dismayed by the lack of wit and mental acuity that Verne often imparts to her other characters. I found the verbal bantering and conversations dull and lacking in even the most simple of intellect. If I was to survive among such fellows whose chief concerns where often superfluous goods like tobacco, I would almost undoubtedly go insane just for sheer want of solitude. Perhaps that is where Harding succeeded and I would not.
Perhaps the most disappointing part of the book was the end. Not wishing to discourage those who are yet reading from finishing rather warning them of impending disappoint. I thought there was some higher purpose to the almost magical happenings of the Mysterious Island, yet the climax’s lack of substance enraged me to the point that I was ready to fly in balloon to my own island intent in providing a better explanation of the mysteries of the island than Verne’s advertising campaign that filled the last pages of a disappointing work of literature. ( )

I love this book, and I've read it 6 times! ( )

What a fascinating story. As attractive now as when I read it as a teenager. This doesn't read as an old story, but rather as a modern story about an old subject. ( )