A review by rosekk
From the Earth to the Moon by Jules Verne
4.0
I liked the slightly unusual focus of the plot - unlike many stories (which tend to focus on what happens as a result of a great invention, Verne's other work included), this story focus on it's creation. The process of planning and creating this great piece of technology was the adventure.
The story was funny in places, and did a great job of capturing the scale of a venture like this. Parts of the planning could be a little dry to read; the calculations and scientific debates, which sometimes seemed to be on very shaky ground, could be a bit of a slog. For all that, managed to lend a sense of excitement to proceedings for the most part.
The tale was let down by the characters though. I liked Barbicane (though he wasn't the most detailed of characters - other than being daring and brainy, I didn't get much of a sense of who he was as an individual). The other characters mostly passed me by; some struck me as annoyingly unrealistic, the others just bland. It was a shame that a generally good story was so short on interesting people to feature in it.
The story was funny in places, and did a great job of capturing the scale of a venture like this. Parts of the planning could be a little dry to read; the calculations and scientific debates, which sometimes seemed to be on very shaky ground, could be a bit of a slog. For all that, managed to lend a sense of excitement to proceedings for the most part.
The tale was let down by the characters though. I liked Barbicane (though he wasn't the most detailed of characters - other than being daring and brainy, I didn't get much of a sense of who he was as an individual). The other characters mostly passed me by; some struck me as annoyingly unrealistic, the others just bland. It was a shame that a generally good story was so short on interesting people to feature in it.