Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne a Review

Are you a science fiction fan? Do you like adventure novels? Then you'll love Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne!The Extraordinary Journeys: Around the World in Eighty Days 

You may or may not know this, but Jules Verne is one of the grandfathers of science fiction! HG Wells is the other granddaddy.

It took me a while to warm up to the science fiction. Now I feel more comfortable reading science novels.

If you're new to science fiction, Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne could be your introduction to the genre.

In a hurry to get started? CLICK HERE to grab your personal copy of Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne from Amazon!

Below, you'll find my book review and summary of Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days!

All images in this post are clickable! 

Seven Key Lessons from Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

1.  Be flexible.
2. Be careful who you take into your confidence – loose lips sink ships.
3. The best laid plans fall apart so have a Plan B.
4. Even the most fastidious person makes mistakes.
5. Believe in yourself.
6. Take chances in life and don’t always play it safe.
7. Life is never just about you.

Who Was Jules Verne?The Life and Times of Jules VerneJules Verne: The Biography Of An Imagination

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Initial Thoughts on Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

The Extraordinary Journeys: Around the World in Eighty Days 

Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne is set in the 1870s and is a book of contradictions (Review of Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne). Phileas Fogg appears mysterious to others because they really do not know much about him.

He is a man of few words, but when he speaks, his words count. People do not know where he is from, or anything about his family. They can tell that he is a man of means, yet he doesn’t employ much help in his household, which helps to stem the gossip about him. Around the World in Eighty days is a hero's journey.

Phileas Fogg is called to take a trip around the world and complete it in a short time span. The main theme of the story is traveling around the globe in just 80 days, and it is also about perseverance.

Have you read?

Review of  Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne

Self-Mentoring Strategy

To get the most from this SummaReview of Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne, after you have read the book review/summary, reflectively answer the following questions:

1. What can you learn from the ideas in the SummaReview?
2. What is one action that you can take as a result of reading this SummaReview?
3. What are five takeaways from the SummaReview?
4. What has made an impression on you while reading?
5. Is there a framework that you can use in your life and work?
6. How do the concepts in the SummaReview relate to what you already know?
7. How can you combine key ideas from the profile with what you already know to create a new idea?
8. Is this a book you’d like to read for yourself? Why? Why not?

What is Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne About?

Fogg knows a lot about the world, information that only one well travelled would know, and is often correcting others, yet no one can ever remember a time when he wasn’t around. No one remembers him taking a trip for any length of time. Fogg is also very set in his ways – he leaves his home the same time every day and returns the same time every night and takes the same number of steps to and from.

When he leaves he goes to the Reform Club to have his meals. Fogg always sits at the same table in the same room, and eats alone. He also enjoys a good game of whist and reading the paper. He is so set in his ways, that he fires his manservant because the water he uses to shave was 84 degrees Fahrenheit instead of 86.

Although Phileas Fogg is very set in his ways, he is also charitable, giving money to the poor.

Upon a recommendation, Fogg employs Jean Passepartout to be his new manservant. Passepartout is ready for a change and believes working for Fogg is exactly what he is looking for – he wants predictability and sameness. When he looks at the schedule for his daily work, he is very contented and believes he has landed in the perfect job. Passepartout is French, but left his homeland a few years before. In a previous life, he was a gymnast.

The same day Fogg hires Passepartout life changes for both of them. While playing whist at the Reform Club with his regular partners – Andrew Stuart, an engineer; John Sullivan and Samuel Fallentin, bankers; Thomas Flanagan, a brewer; and Gauthier Ralph, one of the directors of the Bank of England – they have a conversation about a bank robbery of 55,000 pounds at the Bank of England. In those days, they did not have the kind of security we have today and to hear the description, what they actually had was no security. The money was taken from the principal cashier’s table.

During the conversation, they try to figure out who the bank robber could be. Fogg mentions that the world is no longer as big as it was. So of course there is a question about what he means by that. Stuart tries to explain how the world is smaller, and postulates that you can travel around the world in three months. Fogg interjects saying that it’s only eighty days, and John Sullivan agrees with him and proceeds to give them the breakdown which was in the Daily Telegraph:

Breakdown of 80-Day Trip: Mapping Fogg's Trip Around the World in Eighty Days

Stuart exclaims that the time doesn’t take into account bad weather, shipwrecks, contrary winds, railways accidents and other events likely to delay a trip. Phileas Fogg tells them that all of those eventualities are included in the time, and during the time the conversation is going on, he calmly plays whist when it is his turn. The events that the others mention that would likely lengthen a trip around the world, Fogg calmly responds that all those events are included in the 80 days.

Phileas Fogg takes up the challenge to travel around the world in 80 days. He bets 20,000 pounds that he can do it. They accept the bet and Fogg decides to leave that very night. The deal is that Phileas Fogg leaves Wednesday, October 2^nd and return Saturday, December 21^st at 9 pm at the Reform Club. He hands them a cheque for 20,000 pounds, which they will cash if the trip takes more than 80 days. They sign a memorandum of the agreement and now the wager is legal.

He gets home much earlier than his schedule says and that upsets Passepartout, who is looking for predictability. When Fogg informs his manservant about the trip, Passepartout is “overcome with stupefied astonishment.”

Fogg has 40,000 pounds, which is a very large sum in the 1870s. He has wagered half and will use the other half for the trip. He decides to travel light, buying what he and Passepartout need on the way. Fogg makes sure that he takes a copy of Bradshaw’s Continental Railway Steam Transit and General Guide, which has a timetable of the departures and arrivals of steamers and railways.

Around The World In 80 Days Video

(This film adaptation is very different from the book.)

The 80-Day Trip Begins

His five friends from the Reform Club see them off on their journey around the world in eighty days. Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne is a page turner, and although the author is a pioneer in science fiction, this book captivates the reader, and he disperses history bites throughout the book.

After Fogg leaves London, there is much talk about the wager to travel the world in eighty days, and the newspapers – The Times, Standard, Morning Post, Daily News and 20 other respected newspapers – get caught up in the hype. They think Fogg is mad, except for The Daily Telegraph, which is his sole media supporter. People start to take bets as to whether or not Fogg can complete the journey in the specified timeframe. The bets are against Fogg, 100 and 150 to one.

The Commissioner of Police becomes very suspicious of Fogg. He thinks Fogg is the bank robber and intends to escape by going on the trip. They dispatch Detective Fix to go after Fogg. This is a fantastic book with so many lessons. Early on in the book, we see Fogg as a very inflexible person, but is that who he is? Or is he someone who believes in himself?

Whenever he encounters a challenge he calmly finds a solution because he is determined to win the wager. When he misses one of the steamers along the way, he finds another way to reach his destination, and is able to do so because he has the means.

Fogg keeps meticulous notes on his travel, and makes sure that he gets a visa stamped into his passport even when he doesn’t need to because he wants indisputable proof that he has completed his journey.

When the train they are travelling on in India runs out of track because the railway is not completed, he buys an elephant, Kiouni, and hires a Parsee as a guide. Although it can be dangerous, the guide takes them on a route that’s hidden – through the Indian forest. On their way, they encounter some Brahmins who are on their way to give a human sacrifice to the goddess Kali – the Goddess of love and death.

The guide informs them that it’s an unwilling sacrifice and tells them about Aouda, the young woman who is being sacrificed. At this point in his journey, Fogg is ahead of schedule due to a steamer taking less time than anticipated. Fogg and his group stage a rescue to get Aouda, and Passepartout’s days as a gymnast come in very handy.

When Aouda recovers from the influence of opiates she was exposed to she is able to talk to them and Fogg learns that she has a well-to-do relative in Hong Kong. He thinks that’s the best thing for her is to take her to Hong Kong since staying in India may cause the Brahmins to kidnap her again to use as a human sacrifice. When they arrive in Hong Kong they learn that Aouda’s relative no longer lives there and probably lives in Holland so, Fogg decides to take the young woman with him on his journey.

You see Auoda falling in love with her protector, but it appears that Fogg is quite unaware. He appears to people to have a heart of stone. Along the journey Detective Fix befriends Passepartout and the manservant has loose lips. Ever heard of the phrase, “loose lips sink ships?” He gives Fix too much information even though the detective initially doesn’t disclose his identity. Even when Fix tells Passepartout that he is a detective, and that he believes that Fogg is the bank robber, the manservant doesn’t believe it for a second, yet he doesn’t tell his master.

Fix does many things to undermine Fogg on his trip. When they backfire, he decides to support the adventurer until he gets back on British soil, so that he can arrest him. Fogg is an honourable man, and the reader sees that time and time again. When the train they are on from San Francisco is attacked by Indians, and Passepartout is taken away with a couple of other passengers, Fogg goes after them, and he rescues them.

He is willing to try new things. When the train leaves them because it’s on a schedule and cannot wait for him to find the kidnapped passengers, when Fogg returns, he is willing to ride on a sledge at the suggestion of Fix. That is the only way to reach New York in time to get back to England before December 21^st.

When they arrive on British soil, Fix arrests Fogg for being a bank robber. Fogg he sees his last 20,000 pounds disappearing before his eyes. Hours later, Fix returns after discovering that the real bank robber was captured a few days before. The usually calm Fogg punches the detective.

Fogg, Passepartout and Aouda go to his residence in London. He is quite sad because he has lost the bet and no longer has any money. Auoda says she will marry him, and he accepts because he is in love with her. Fogg sends Passepartout for the Reverend Samuel Wilson to marry them the next day, which is Monday, but the place is closed.

It turns out that because of the route they took to travel the world in 80 days, going east to west, they gained a day, which they hadn’t accounted for, so Fogg is able to get to the Reform Club on time after all.

Should You Buy Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne?

I recommend Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne. The book is a page turner, and any reader who loves a good story will enjoy reading it. Just to recap, here are seven lessons that you'll learn.

1.  Be flexible.
2. Be careful who you take into your confidence – loose lips sink ships.
3. The best laid plans fall apart so have a Plan B.
4. Even the most fastidious person makes mistakes.
5. Believe in yourself.
6. Take chances in life and don’t always play it safe.
7. Life is never just about you.

 Around the World in Eighty Days (Dover Thrift Editions) Around the World in 80 Days (Two-Disc Special Edition) Around the World in 80 Days: by Jules Verne (Unabridged) Around the World in 80 Days: The Complete Epic Mini-Series Around the World in 80 Days (Widescreen Edition)

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