The adventure begins when a strange Icelander parchment is uncovered in an old bookstore and reaches a fevered pitch that never lets up as Professor Lidenbrock, his nephew Axel, and their guide, Hans, journey to the center of the earth. From the moment they reach the extinct volcano of the Mountain of Sneffels and make their treacherous descent, their chances of reaching the surface alive again become very slim, as they encounter boiling seas, serpent-like monsters, prehistoric apes and an eerie otherworld from which no man has ever escaped. This book embodies the combination of believable science and wonderment that made Jules Verne the father of modern science fiction.