A review by jayshay
An Antarctic Mystery by Jules Verne, Fiction, Fantasy & Magic by Jules Verne

2.0

(A 2.5 review) Verne is an odd guy to write a sequel to Poe's The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. He's arguably the father of hard science fiction - a very prosaic/rational author to Poe's nightmare visions. The differing orientation is the chief source of disappoint for me: Pym's final vision is dismissed as a hallucination and replaced with a rational - quasi-scientific mystery. What Verne does give us is a well written 'men in extremis' story, with the usual tensions shipboard of the honourable officers against the craven lower seamen. Though the fate of Dirk Peters was just groan inducing. I liked 'the half-breed' Peters as a bastard in Poe far more than as a whinging loyal servant going on about "my poor Pym!"