Finding Nemo

1868: Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea

It's not rocket science to know that my primary reason for including this book in my timeline-reading list was Nemo's awesome inclusion in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. That also happens to make it a convenient kick off point for my book series in this blog. However, I was also motivated by the fact that Jules Verne had helped create the GENRE of science-fiction, and I had dismissed his work as a child. Submarines were obviously not quite so exciting over 100 years later, and the Disney movie was a bit of a turn off for me, even as a kid. Did Alan Moore help me to see old Victorian fiction in a different light? Hell yes.

I rated this book five stars on my Facebook review sites, and I won't back down much from that. LOVED IT. There are definately parts that drag, but you have to admit the pages and pages of descriptions of sea life do lend credibility to the viewpoint of the narrator, which in turn makes a novel that at the time was pretty far-fetched seem like a true story.

Nemo is less a villian than an anti-hero, and although I would have enjoyed more action/conflict as opposed to twenty page recitations of marine life, the inclusion of Atlantis and some of the other trips of the Nautilus seem like Nemo was ready-made for a cross-stream fictional universe.

What did you think of the book? Are you a little more motivated to check it out now if you haven't yet read it? Let me know.