Around the World in 80 Days

Part manhunt, part love story, part social satire, but mostly a race against the clock, Around the World in 80 Days is Jules Verne's most rollicking novel. When Phileas Fogg, a wealthy British gentleman who lives his life "with mathemetical predictability," bets the fellow members of his club £20,000 that he can circle the earth in just eighty days, he and his new valet, Passepartout, set out on a whirlwind tour of the globe that will challenge their luck, their wits, and their wallets. En route they ride an elephant smack into an exotic murder cult, steer an undersized sailboat through rampaging storms, and outrun sharp-shooting Sioux, man-eating wolves, and Scotland Yard's dimmest detective—only to see everything go hopelessly haywire until Verne springs the slyest of surprise endings. It's one of the planet's favorite thrillers, and Frederick Paul Walter's reader-friendly translation captures its roguish wit and humor, packages its Americana with exceptional accuracy (one-fourth of the tale takes place in the United States), and is complete and unabridged down to the smallest substantive detail.