#545 in our old book database. Not rated.

I was intrigued with what Jules Verne was going to do with Edgar Allan Poe's story of 'Pym'... surprisingly Verne's story is almost sixty years after Poe published his only novel. The characters here think that Pym's story is real and so set out for Antarctica to find characters from Poe's story. For some reason, Verne decided on a full ten page recap of Edgar Allan Poe's entire novel and not just parts of the book relevant to this novel.... and then proceeded to omit some of the details of the original I thought were most important. Otherwise, it seems like Jules Verne just twists some things around from Poe's story, maybe tying up some loose ends, which is a problem I had with Poe's novel... but some of it seemed a little too coincidental... I can appreciate Verne wanting to improve upon the mess that I think Poe's story is though! Otherwise Verne sticks to a more realistic story, with some crazy natural events as Verne loves to throw in there. ( )

An unofficial sequel to Poe's, 'Narrative of Arthur Gordan Pym'. If i was Poe i'd be pretty insulted. It seems to purposefully undercut the weirdness of the Pym story at every opportunity. Before adding Verne's own more scientific weirdness to the plot. Ultimately though its a wasted effort as its as average as Pym was, just in a different way. ( )

This is the first Jules Verne novel I have read and I enjoyed it. The reason I read this book is because it is the "sequel" to Edgar A Poe's "The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym". If you have read that novel, you realize that Poe left off rather abruptly and did not finish his narrative. I'm not sure why. It bothered me quite a bit - I wanted to know what happened!

Well, apparently, Jules Verne did too. He wrote this continuation of Poe's novel in 1895. Originally in French, I read an English translation. The introduction in my edition was from 1975 and explained how Poe, Verne, and Wells were instrumental in the birth of science fiction. Jules Verne believed in the supernatural but not in the same way as Poe did - or as Poe wrote. He was strictly scientific and wanted his books to be true to science, or at least the science that they knew back then. He believed in God and God's will and it is apparent in his book that Providence played a huge part. Poe wrote of things happening beyond our control and not always in a good sense. Verne is more clear cut about morals - bad things happen to bad people and if bad things happen to good people, it is because there is some greater good.

This is the story of Mr. Jeorling (an unpronounceable name for me), a scientist who is in the Kerguelen islands at the beginning of the story. He becomes a passenger on the Halbrane, commanded by Captain Len Guy. After picking up more men in the Falkland Islands, they journey to Antarctica in search of the pole and of the crew of the Jane, mentioned in the Poe story. Mr. Jeorling remarks that Poe wrote a fiction story but the captain contends it is a true narrative. So the journey begins. Of course we know so much more about Antarctica now, but it's still a fun read.

It gave me some closure, even though it was not written by Poe. The story moved along quite well. I did get tired of Verne always referring to one of the men on the ship as "the half-breed" throughout the book. As he was one of the main characters, this got very tiring. In many ways it was definitely a 19th century novel. ( )

An Antarctic Mystery (French: Le Sphinx des glaces) was written in 1897, in response to Edgar Allan Poe's 1838 novel The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket. It follows the adventures of the narrator and his journey from the Kerguelen Islands aboard the ship Halbrane to the South Pole. During their adventures, they find the source of strong magnetic fields, an Ice Sphinx.

An Antarctic Mystery is a two-volume novel by Jules Verne. It follows the adventures of the narrator and his journey from the Kerguelen Islands aboard Halbrane.

This audio edition contains both parts of the original novel.

Narrator is unknown and leaves a lot to be desired. ( )