Nothing speaks to the heart of man like a good tale of adventure. Whether in the form of a bedtime story read to young boys or a nail biting page turner that keeps you up at night, the adventure story is one genre of literature that stays with you for a lifetime. The very mention of such novels brings to mind images of buried treasure, hidden deep in the jungle of a deserted island, protected by dastardly pirates and the local cannibal population. Or perhaps the mind jumps instead to the image of a forgotten world, complete with lost civilization and monstrous creatures of a bygone era.
Whatever your personal adventure fantasy, there are some stories we all can relate to. Listed here, in no particular order, are fifty adventure novels that no man should go a lifetime without reading. This is not considered a complete list of all the great adventure novels, so please take advantage of the comments section to share what other adventure novels you recommend to your fellow men. Also, be sure to stay tuned for the upcoming second part of this series, The Essential Man’s Library: 50 Nonfiction Adventure Books Edition.
And now, to jump into the world of high adventure….
(Note to RSS and Email readers: Because of the length of this post we had to break it up into sections in order for it to appear in your reader or inbox. So, you’ll have to come to site to click through past the first 10. Sorry for the inconvenience.)
Hatchet by Gary Paulsen
A tale of survival, Hatchet traces the story of young Brian, who is left stranded in the Canadian wilderness when his plane crashes. Forced to survive with little food or gear, Brian’s will to live is put to the test.
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
Easily the best known adventure novel, this is Stevenson’s masterpiece. The son of an innkeeper, young Jim Hawkins finds himself thrust into the world of piracy as he joins Long John Silver in the search for buried treasure.
Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss
Stranded on a desert island as a result of a catastrophic shipwreck, a family is forced to survive with nothing but the natural resources available. Eventually, they are able to create an impressive compound within which they are able to live at ease in their jungle surroundings.
Captains Courageous by Rudyard Kipling
Follow the adventures of Harvey Cheyne, son of a railroad tycoon, as he is thrown overboard on a steamship journey, only to be rescued by fishermen who eventually mold him into a true seafarer.
She by H. Rider Haggard
A college professor and his young apprentice follow instructions on a broken pottery shard that lead them to a fabled lost city in the jungles of Africa, where they encounter She Who Must Be Obeyed, the seemingly immortal ruler of the land.
Ayesha: The Return of She by H. Rider Haggard
Set sixteen years after the events of She, this novels follows the same characters as they travel to the far reaches of the earth seeking out a reincarnation of She Who Must Be Obeyed.
King Solomon’s Mines by H. Rider Haggard
Adventurer Allan Quatermain is drafted into a search and rescue party that leads into the great unknown of unexplored Africa, where entire civilizations are discovered and rumors of the location of the mines of King Solomon lead the team on one of the greatest adventures in all of literature.
Out of the dark we came, into the dark we go. Like a storm-driven bird at night we fly out of the Nowhere; for a moment our wings are seen in the light of the fire, and, lo! we are gone again into the Nowhere.
Southern Mail/Night Flight by Antoine de Saint-Exupery
A two for one deal, this book chronicles the dangerous lives of the early mail pilots as told by Saint-Exupery, author of Wind, Sand and Stars and himself an accomplished pilot.
The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle
This timeless classic by Arthur Conan Doyle inspired the imagination of countless young boys and spawned what is now known as the Lost World genre. Inside its pages the protagonist, Professor Challenger, plays tour guide on an undiscovered plateau in South America, filled with dinosaurs and other mystical creatures that time seemingly forgot.
The Man Who Would Be King by Rudyard Kipling
Rudyard Kipling’s famous short story about two wandering British adventurers who somehow manage to become kings of Kafiristan, only to suffer a drastic fall from power.
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The only one I noticed missing was Captain Joshua Slocum’s “Sailing Alone Around the World”. My all-time favorite adventure story.
2 words, Zane Grey
A fair number of my recommendations have already been covered, but I’ll focus some things.
Edgar Rice Burroughs: Read “A Princess of Mars”, “Gods of Mars”, and “Warlord of Mars”. The other Barsooom stories are good, but those are the essentials.
Ian Fleming: “Casino Royale”, “From Russia With Love”, “Moonraker”, “Thunderball”, “On Her Magesty’s Secret Service”, and “You Only Live Twice”. The Bond novels are VERY erratic in quality, these are the best.
Tom Clancy: “The Hunt For Red October”, and “The Sum of All Fears”. Maybe “Red Storm Rising”.
Robert Heinlein: “Starship Troopers” and “The Moon is a Harsh Mistress”.
Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle: “The Mote in God’s Eye”.
And last but never least….
E. E. Smith’s Lensman Series.
Two Years Before The Mast by Richard Dana – a stunning depiction of “going off to sea”
Dune
I would add:
Last of the Mohicans (and really all of the Leatherstocking Tales) by James Fenimore Cooper – my all time favorites
Little Britches by Ralph Moody – not so much adventure as a Dad teaching his son what it means to be a man.
Great list, though. Thanks
@Todd K
+1 for Dune! I finally read the book for the first time this year. If anyone (like me) has put off reading it because they saw the awful 1980s Kyle McLachlan debacle do yourself a favor and read this book. Truly, epic sci-fi that is so much smarter than the movie. Highly recommended
@Jon
+1 for Ender’s Game — Fantastic book about young boys saving the Earth from Alien Invaders. For another excellent series by Ender author, Orson Scott Card, check out the Alvin Maker series.
@Michael Summer
+1 for the Dark Tower series — hardly anyone is manlier than Roland of Gilead!
I would have to add Dune by Frank Herbert. That book left a mark on my life.
Awesome! Glad to see Tarzan on the list; I read all 23 while growing up. Tarzan was the Übermensch, and his influence shaped my character.
I take issue with this list as a classics major. The Odyssey was not -written-. The Odyssey was orally composed along with the Iliad.
I think Geoff missed the point of the list.
Good list. I think you should add Beowulf, and Virgil’s Aeneid.
I would make two additions, one for young people, and one for the older crowd.
Despite it’s odd nature, I can’t think of a better young adult adventure series than the Time Quartet by Madeleine L’Engle. I buy them for all of my young relatives. They excite the young mind with adventure as well as open it with new and interesting, if a little cockeyed, concepts. Among the best adventure writing for the young mind.
And no mention should be made of Fleming without Le Carre. The adventures of Smiley and the Circus are exciting and heartbreaking, and from beginning to end Le Carres writing is brilliant and top tier adventure writing. no one should go without. Especially Spy Who Came In From The Cold, A Constant Gardener, and A Perfect Spy.
Just a few others:
Every Man’s Bible (New Living Translation)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1414321635?ie=UTF8&tag=tremathoma-20&link_code=as3&camp=211189&creative=373489&creativeASIN=1414321635
Wild at Heart by John Eldredge
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0785266356?ie=UTF8&tag=tremathoma-20&link_code=as3&camp=211189&creative=373489&creativeASIN=0785266356
World Without End by Ken Follett
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1845790324?ie=UTF8&tag=tremathoma-20&link_code=as3&camp=211189&creative=373489&creativeASIN=1845790324
Odd Thomas by Dean Koontz
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0553584499?ie=UTF8&tag=tremathoma-20&link_code=as3&camp=211189&creative=373489&creativeASIN=0553584499
I am not sure what to make of the fact that two of the four Haggard titles (and one of the other two was the very last) are about his weakest books, written before he knew what he was doing, and the one John Buchan is also an apprentice work. On Buchan try Mister Standfast or The Three Hostages or Huntingtower. (A princess being rescued from imprisonment in a tower by ta troop of imaginary Boy Scouts!)
You should have at least one Talbot Mundy, perhaps The Winds of the World.
You people read too much in the way of best sellers and do too little digging up for yourselves.
Tai Pan is probably my favorite book of all time. I have read and reread it, never ceases to entertain.
Captain Blood by Rafael Sabatini is some mighty manly fare.
As to Hemingway’s “True At First Light,” it is not “manly ” to hunt an animal you’re not going to eat just out of simple blood lust, which is what Hemingway did. One of our greatest writers, but I always have trouble reconciling that with the kind of person he was.
The Polish national epic, With Fire and Sword, by Henryk Sienkiewicz, is a terrific story, in league with The Three Musketeers.
Prisoner of Zenda is also terriffic
A lot of Dan Brown’s non-movie books are very good. Digital Fortress was one that I remember greatly enjoying.
Awesome list! I can’t wait to get started!
I just ordered 2 of these and 2 of the non-fiction. Something to break up my James Bond marathon haha
Byzantium and Hood by Stephen Lawhead.
The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara
The King Must Die by Mary Renault
Anything by Helen MacInnes, Patrick O’Brian, or Rex Stout.
I would add Rogue Male, by Geoffrey Household. A self-reliant individualist sets out to assassinate a dictator who is either Hitler or Stalin (Household deliberately fudges the identity, making it clear that he considers one totalitarian to be the same as another). Then he goes on the run and must survive by his wits while secret policeman track him down. The movie versions turned the story into an anti-Nazi period piece, but it’s really a celebration of the value of liberty and the competent individual.
Definitely Dune by Frank Herbert is a must add to the list, full of politic, social and ecological metaphors that points to the building of a leader. Also The Never Ending Story by Michael Ende is a profound novel of self discovery through a fantastic travel in which the main character, Bastian Baltasar Bux, loses and then founds himself.
Great lost, I’m excited o read some of these!
I would add James Clavell’s Shogun to the lost for sure. Blackthorne is a man!
For the younger audience I would suggest “My Side of the Mountain” by Jean Craighead George. A story of a young boy running away from home to escape city life and survive in the mountains. I read it in the third grade and it has been one of my favorites ever since. Always stirred in me a desire to try it for myself.
From an author known more for horror than adventure, I would add Stephen King’s Dark Tower Series. It contains seven books in all, with both an incredible plot, and some very interesting commentary on human nature and the balance/struggle between good and evil. Not for young readers, but perfect for adolescents and adults.
For Hemingway, I think For Whom The Bell Tolls would be a better choice. It has everything–war, love, mountain wilderness adventure, blowing stuff up, booze.
I would also suggest Siddhartha by Herman Hesse. It is an inward adventure, I guess, but no less manly.
Thanks for the list! I’ve read some of them.
Gulliver’s Travels
Dune
Three books that inspried me when I was a younger were: Rifles for Watie, The Red Badge of Courage, and Johnny Tremain. Could not believe they were not listed.
Ulysses, by James Joyce
The Sound and the Fury, by William Faulkner
A Farewell to Arms, by Ernest Hemingway
I enjoyed the list; a couple of tweaks- Tarzan was raised by apes, not gorillas ( Bolgani the Gorilla was a tribal hated enemy), and I would submit that Stranger in a Strange Land by Heinlein should be on every must read list..
There are the books you read, and then there are the books that change your life.
George MacDonald Fraser’s Flashman novels are hilarious, appalling, and thrilling. Harry Flashman is a confessed coward, but also a keen observer of human nature and of true (and valuable) courage. The books I like best in the series are Flashman, Flash for Freedom, Flashman at the Charge, Flashman in the Great Game, and Flashman and the Redskins. If you can, pick up “Quartered Safe out Here”, Fraser’s memoir of his experiences in the Second World War. Not an adventure story, but great.
I also heartily recommend PC Wren’s “Beau Geste”, a story of three orphaned brothers who join the French Foreign Legion. It has one of the greatest set-ups I have ever read–a column of the Legion rushing to relieve a beleaguered outpost finds all of its defenders dead at their posts. Read the book before you watch the decent Gary Cooper movie of the same title
Finally, just a general observation: Virtually all of the books (at least those with which I am familiar) mentioned in the comments above are great, but I many of them are patently not adventure stories (James Joyce, I am looking at you). For example, John Le Carre has never written an adventure story. I loved the Smiley trilogy, Little Drummer Girl, the Spy Who Came in From the Cold, Constant Gardener, et al. But adventure? Not at all. Spy stories are not necessarily adventurous. Many of them have more in common with the morally ambiguous, bleak, seediness of classic noir.
I suppose we can debate the meaning of adventure, and some voyages of discovery are internal (as the gentleman who recommends Siddhartha suggests). Still, there are enough undiscovered stories of adventure out there that it seems we would be better served by sticking to books that don’t require a tortured explanation as to why they are appropriate for the list.
I heartily recommend Lars Walker’s novels, the most recent of which is “West Oversea.” It’s about turn-of-the-millennium vikings in Sola, Norway, with Erling Skjalgsson as a lord over a small area. The conflict is essentially old world magical beings and their followers against new world ideas and beliefs. “The Year of the Warrior” is a another story of that type. Search for Lars Walker online to buy them.
I have to agree with some of the other people that Shogun should have made the list and is a must read.
What a great list! Gotta love Sea Wolf by London but I think Star Rover beats it out as my favorite London Novel.
And no master and commander??
My great-grandfather was a man’s-man and survived a life of punishing himself physically while bringing love to my household when I was a youngster… if I were half the man he was, I’d consider it a success. That being said, I probably bought him 3 large-print copies of Captain Blood for him in the 10 years he lived with us… he reread it over and over and that book definitely deserves to be on the list.
And, Sam, (right above) I’m pissed you said it first, but in the same pirate-y vein, O’Brien’s Master and Commander deserves a place on the list.
I’m also surprised at the lack of sci-fi, but maybe that’s not what this list was about… a little Dune would have made me happy, and well as maybe some Philip K. Dick for Blade Runner… maybe even a little fantasy — Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland was one hell of an adventure, after all, right?
I liked the strong Clive Cussler presence and agree with the previous poster that Clancy was noticeably missing in an adventure list.
Thanks for a great site, webmaster.
Just no one submit the Twilight series, ok?
No mention of Endurance? The true story of Ernest Shackleton’s failed attempt to be the first man to cross the Antarctic, which turned into a fight for survival after his ship was crushed by pack ice before reaching the contintnet. Every member of his crew survived, but it took them more than a year to reach civilization, surviving on wits and ingenuity. Shackleton was a true man’s man.
Oops, I see now it’s a list of fiction. My mistake!
No fiction adventure book list is complete without mention of Wilbur Smith. The stories of manly men and beautiful women set in the wilds of Africa…it doesn’t get much better than that. Start with “When the Lion Feeds” and go from there.
Thanks to my son I have a suggestion to and to this already wonderful list. It is a newer set of books that I found to be a wonderful trip down memory lane. The author has tied in so many cameos from other great books you will feel like you are seeing old friends again. But that’s just my 2 cents here is the title of the series and a short quote.
The Imaginarium Geographica- Here their be dragons
“What is it?” John asked.
The little man blinked and arched an eyebrow. “It is the world, my boy,” he said. “All the World, in ink and blood, vellum and parchment, leather and hide. It is the World, and it is yours to save or lose.”
I was so glad to find my two favorite manly novels on this list- “King Solomon’s Mines” and “The Mysterious Island.”
A great moment in “King Solomon’s Mines” is when two characters are introduced to each other: the European Sir Curtis, and the African Umbopa. The two were identically built, with large powerful bodies. Umbopa remarks, after observing the other: “We are both men, you and I.” In context it is an awesome moment.
The Mysterious Island is one of the greatest celebrations of the ingenuity of man I’ve ever read. When they’re constructing nitroglycerin from raw materials to blow a hole in a rock and create a river, I knew I was reading something extraordinary. The book is about hunting and building things, what more do you need?
In the same vein as Tolken, my favorite adventure series ( which happen to be scifi/fantasy) are The Dragonlance Trilogy (dragons of autumn twilight, dragons of winter night, and dragons of spring dawn) with grand adventure, plenty of identification with characters, character developement, and it’s a tradgedy that they are not more well known.
Also, the Dark Elf Trilogy (before the Icewind Dale trilogy, also set in the Dungeons and Dragons universe) being Homeland, Exile, and Sojourn, had grand adventure, magic, politics, and growth. Drizzt is shown to be so human in these books that it is dificult to not identify with him, which makes the adventure so much more real to the reader! Definately a must (on both trilogies)
3rd post here on AoM. Guess it’s time to man up and sign up
i’ve discovered i love jules vern, i’m enthralled by anything he’s ever written!! my favorite auther im guessing….sorry, im not much of a man, sorry to crash the party but i love adventure and adventure stories. :3 i keep seeing all my favorites in this list, i have so many of hem, but i didn’t know about some of these, im going to go by them lolol
theres this amazing app for the iphone where you get all these literary classics for only i dollar, reads just like a Kindle, its fantastic!!! im just now reading 20,000 leagues under the sea, and i think its bumped up to one of my favorites!!! Monte Cristos next XP awesome list guys, thanks~!!
Just a slight correction… these are not “fictional adventure books”… they are very real. They’re “Fiction Adventure Books” or less awkwardly, “Adventure Fiction”.
Life of Pi. My favorite adventure book.
darktower series
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