The Mysterious Island

When Union engineer Cyrus Harding and four companions are hurled across the Pacific in a hijacked Confederate balloon, they land on a remote volcanic island with nothing but the clothes on their backs. What follows is a masterclass in human ingenuity: fire conjured from watch-glass lenses, nitroglycerine synthesized in a jungle, and a civilization built from raw nature. But as their colony grows, impossible events stack up — a shipwreck chest arrives at the perfect moment, a dying man is cured by medicine no one sent, a pirate fleet is destroyed by an underwater torpedo. Someone is watching over them. And that someone is far more extraordinary than any of them could imagine.