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ericbuscemi 's review for:
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
by Jules Verne
This book got off to such a great start. Read the following in your best movie preview announcer voice.
A mysterious sea monster haunting the world's seas... an expedition to hunt it down... a meeting, ending in the imprisonment of our hero and his comrades in the belly of -- not a monster -- but a mysterious underwater vessel... the Nautilus, a character unto itself, and its enigmatic owner, their captor, Captain Nemo.
From that point I was hooked. I wanted to know all about Captain Nemo, his mysterious business, and the fate of his three prisoner guests.
Unfortunately, Jules Verne had a different idea at that point. He decided to use this incredible set-up as a reason to give dozens upon dozens of pages of the novel to cataloging the different fish and other sea creatures they encounter in their 20,000 league journey. The book could probably easily be separated into the adventure story I was looking for, and the nautical encyclopedia that I instead found.
Despite these lengthy expository segments, there are still many moments of excitement and wonder -- the coral forests, the shipwrecks, the pearl diving, the underwater volcano, the South Pole, the underwater graveyard, Atlantis, the battle with the giant squid, etc. -- hiding within its pages.
Having excised the cataloging -- which the narrator himself admits is dry and boring -- and having an ending that revealed more of the mystery behind Captain Nemo, this could have easily been a four-star book.
A mysterious sea monster haunting the world's seas... an expedition to hunt it down... a meeting, ending in the imprisonment of our hero and his comrades in the belly of -- not a monster -- but a mysterious underwater vessel... the Nautilus, a character unto itself, and its enigmatic owner, their captor, Captain Nemo.
From that point I was hooked. I wanted to know all about Captain Nemo, his mysterious business, and the fate of his three prisoner guests.
Unfortunately, Jules Verne had a different idea at that point. He decided to use this incredible set-up as a reason to give dozens upon dozens of pages of the novel to cataloging the different fish and other sea creatures they encounter in their 20,000 league journey. The book could probably easily be separated into the adventure story I was looking for, and the nautical encyclopedia that I instead found.
Despite these lengthy expository segments, there are still many moments of excitement and wonder -- the coral forests, the shipwrecks, the pearl diving, the underwater volcano, the South Pole, the underwater graveyard, Atlantis, the battle with the giant squid, etc. -- hiding within its pages.
Having excised the cataloging -- which the narrator himself admits is dry and boring -- and having an ending that revealed more of the mystery behind Captain Nemo, this could have easily been a four-star book.