20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
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- 9,99 €
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- 9,99 €
Publisher Description
After a mysterious sea monster damages an ocean liner, the US government assembles a team in New York City to track down the creature and destroy it. French marine biologist Pierre Aronnax receives a last-minute invitation, as does Canadian harpoonist Ned Land. They leave aboard the Abraham Lincoln, bound for Cape Horn and then the Pacific Ocean.
But all is not as it seems. When they find the monster and attack, the Abraham Lincoln is damaged and Aronnax and Land end up thrown onto the monster's hide. Except where there should be flesh there is metal. The monster is in fact a submarine called the Nautilus, captained by a mysterious renegade named Nemo, who swiftly takes his former pursuers captive aboard his impossible vessel and then dives deep beneath the waves.
So begins the adventure of a lifetime for Aronnax and Land, as Nemo refuses to ever let them leave in case they reveal the truth about the Nautilus. Nemo is on a mission to seek out scientific knowledge and wreak revenge on the civilisation that destroyed his family, a mission that sees the Nautilus explore shipwrecks, hunt sharks, visit the real Atlantis, get attacked by a giant squid and end up stuck in a terrible whirlpool.
With Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, Jules Verne can rightly be considered one of the founding fathers of science fiction. This special edition is based on the original translation that popularised the novel in the English-speaking world, and features an insightful Foreword by naturalist, television presenter and diver Miranda Krestovnikoff.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Verne's classic journey into the ocean follows professor Pierre Aronnax and his two companions as they are captured by Capt. Nemo and find themselves trapped aboard the Nautilus, a high-powered submarine that traverses about the world revealing the mysteries of the sea. James Frain provides clear and crisp narration. His intonation and tone are good, but not good enough to overcome the tedious cataloguing of every crustacean, fish, and shell that Verne includes. Equally problematic, Frain stumbles through some of his reading and has trouble maintaining the voices he provides for the different characters, particularly Nemo, whose voice is quite inconsistent. This, at times, can lead to listener confusion. While this audiobook is, on the whole, enjoyable, it doesn't stand up to other Listening Library productions.