Going on adventures by reading books is the cheapest way to go on adventures! All jokes aside, reading makes impossible adventures possible and great writing makes come to life in your head. We decided to list the ten best adventure books of all time to see which books deserve the title as the best of the best!
Choosing only ten seems unfair to all of the amazing books that won’t be able to compete with the classics. We created a list for the best adventure books of all time so they got their time in the spotlight. These are the ten best adventure books that have shaped the genre.
The Ten Best Adventure Books of All Time
- Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
- Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne
- The Call of the Wild by Jack London
- Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne
- Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs
- Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne
- Life of Pi by Yann Martel
- The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien
- The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
- Gulliver’s Travels by Dr Jonathan Swift
Jules Verne Dominates the List
Jules Verne makes the list three times and that is just incredible. The crazy part is that there are some more Verne novels that could have made it here. This whole list can just be books by Verne and Robert Louis Stevenson and nobody would bat an eye.
Other notable mentions include The Call of the Wild by Jack London, Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs, and Gulliver’s Travels by Jonathan Swift. These are books that shaped the genre and who knows which direction adventure books would have gone without them.
The Hobbit
Considered by many as one of the best adventure novels, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings have become the face of this genre. That is not surprising as these books have come to define the adventure novel and fantasy novel genre. Hundreds of books if not thousands have taken inspiration from these books since publication.
The Count of Monte Cristo
One of my favorite classics of all time has to be The Count of Monte Cristo. It is an adventure novel unlike anything else. The book is entertaining and has held up well centuries later. Who doesn’t love a good revenge story? Even after a couple centuries, this novel is still considered one of the best works of literature.
Conclusion
These are the ten best adventure books of all time and I think they hold up well against any other list. I’m sure some other notable books were overlooked but that is just how these lists go. What books should have been on the list but weren’t? Let us know in the comments below. Until next time, happy reading!
“This whole list can just be books by Verne and Robert Louis Stevenson and nobody would bat an eye.” True, hah!
Hmm, the title of the article is “The Ten Best Adventure Books of All Time.” I have to wonder… according to whom? The listed books are all excellent. But, to state that they are the greatest adventure novels of all time is quite arrogant if they are such simply because of the article authors preference. Sadly this trend in internet articles exists to get us to click on the article and be subjected to pages of clickbait.
Yeah, I’m not a huge fan of these lists; I just found his comment amusing.
Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, Kidnapped, The Little Prince
I can’t believe that anything by Jonathan Krackauer didn’t make the list, most significantly “Into Thin Air” followed by “Into The Wild” Doesn’t specify fiction….
The curse of Challion by Lois McMaster Bujold.
Alive, a bit disturbing but true.
No The a Princess Bride? Boooooo lol
Robinson Crusoe should have definitely made the list. Endurance and The Martian are not classics but are my favorite adventure stories.
I was going to mention Crusoe also. Great book
Life of Pi? Seriously? What about The Martian by Andy Weir or Roger Zelazny’s magnum opus Lord of Light? And where is Melville’s Moby Dick? Or Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn or A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court? All of these—every one—is vastly superior to Martel’s Life of Pi.
Hear hear!!! And King Solomon’s Mines.
Agreed. Haggard practically invented the lost civilization subgenre. If not for Haggard, we might never have had Tarzan.
My comment was in response to Dennis Grace! Especially Melville.
Merci beaucoup.
The Odyssey is just a poem but perhaps needs mentioning.
It’s in the best adventure books list. I didn’t want this to be all Greek mythology stuff.
No Kipling? Not “Kim” or “The Man Who Would Be King?”
39 Steps?
I like your list quite a bit and agree with most of it. What would I change? Endurance by Alfred Lansing! Even though it’s non-fiction, it is one of the most exciting books I’ve ever read—and I already knew how it ended! I’m also partial to Kidnapped by RLS so in my personal list I might put that on. I think the only one on your list I haven’t read is Gulliver’s Travels. I would maybe drop Life of Pi, though I did enjoy it.
The title, headline or subhead should indicate that the list includes only works of fiction. As is, it’s highly misleading.
Yes. Crazy for the Storm — just to name one — was fabulous and certainly outranks Life of Pi in terms of adventure. (And that boy was for real!)
Moby Dick
This list of classics would make any one hate reading.