The Island of Doctor Moreau

Jan 12, 2026 9:25 AM

Author:H G Wells,Margaret Atwood

Adrift in a dinghy, Edward Prendick, the single survivor from the good ship Lady Vain, is rescued by a vessel carrying a profoundly unusual cargo - a menagerie of savage animals. Tended to recovery by their keeper Montgomery, who gives him dark medicine that tastes of blood, Prendick soon finds himself stranded upon an uncharted island in the Pacific with his rescuer and the beasts. Here, he meets Montgomery's master, the sinister Dr. Moreau - a brilliant scientist whose notorious experiments in vivisection have caused him to abandon the civilised world. It soon becomes clear he has been developing these experiments - with truly horrific results.

Reviews

Ideas about currency and calculus become thrilling because of the way Stephenson incorporates them into his story... Huge in scope - rich in detail... This weird, wonderful collision of scholarship and storytelling has no peer

—— Time Out

A rip-roaring, swashbuckling Romance with a capital R ... A blood-soaked, silver-plated depiction of 17th-century life from both ends of the economic scale, and with enough headlong, balls-to-the-wall buccaneering and Machiavellian plotting to satiate the most jaded of palates

—— Ink

Stephenson excels in marrying geekspeak wtih riotous action. When he describes a battle or a duel, his prose acquires thrilling panache... Jack Shaftoe is magnificent, a swashbuckling hero with a foul mouth and few morals, and his adventures are most appealing

—— Guardian

The definitive historical-sci-fi-epic-pirate-comedy-punk-love story. No easy feat, that

—— Entertainment Weekly

One of the most widely enjoyed comic writers in Britain ... his position at the heart of British comedy is as assured as that of the seaside postcard

—— Observer

Our funniest living novelist

—— Daily Telegraph

Reaches a transcendental realm of its own. I couldn't even read it at times, because I was crying and choking with laughter

—— Daily Express

Sharpe is the funniest novelist currently writing ... I sat curled up with laughter

—— Time Out

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