I truly enjoyed learning about some of these explorers for the first time and others learning more about them. The human drive to know our environment can be truly wonderous.

This is a book about some of the greatest explorers in history; from ancient times to the present. From long-distance aviators traveling across continents to mountaineers climbing the tallest peaks and from voyagers discovering new lands to the first explorers, this book covers every adventure by man. While the majority of the explorations were from modern times, there were many truly remarkable tales from ancient times that many don’t know about. This book is a tribute to the determination and hardships encountered by the explorers in their path to glory.

From one of the first recorded pilgrims who climbed Mount Sinai; to Amelia Earhart, the famous American aviator. From the story of breaking the record of “Around the world in 60 days” to the doomed expedition to Antarctica, from Columbus to Marco Polo, this book covers the stories of all the legendary travelers and their fantastic voyages.

The 50 Greatest Explorers in History documents the challenges in early age exploration when it was tough and expensive and often life-threatening. The book is nicely divided into women and men explorers and many unknown women explorers are given their due.

This book covers about 50 different explorers – some ancient and some modern,– in a series of short biographies. Each biography includes a brief overview of their life, their adventure, and some rare pictures with extra detail on their adventures. Some of my favorites to read about were Nellie Bly, Marco Polo, Edmund Hillary, and James Cook. There are many quoted sources so anyone interested in any particular explorer can read about him in-depth.

Overall, If you love reading about real-life adventures, you will really enjoy this book.
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Many thanks to Michelle Rosenberg, NetGalley, and Pen & Sword for the ARC.

Princess Fuzzypants here: I found myself riveted to this book. It covered some of the greatest explorers in history. While the majority of them fell into more modern times, there were some examples from the faraway past as well as the more recent centuries. All of them were interesting people. They searched for something that nobody else had seen or done. They prevailed through immense difficulties, sometimes before they set off on whatever quest they had set. Often it was in the pursuit of the quest they encountered the most horrendous of dangers, sometimes leading to their own demise.

The thought that they might lose their lives seldom seemed to bother them. There was something that they wanted to achieve and they would do whatever it took to get it. Thanks to their courage and resolve many of the things we accept as the norm might not have been discovered. Many of them, certainly in the past several centuries have been members of one exploration society or another so there was often competition that pushed them further and higher.

I am glad they separated the men from the women. The women, simply by virtue of the societal norms that held them back for so long, had the harder road. It is a shame, however, that the chapters on the women were, by large, shorter than than ones on the men. I think that reflects more on the paucity of material from which to research more than any bias. It is telling that in a couple of stories where both sexes were represented, the female was either ignored or minimized regardless of contribution. I think, if anything, it makes those women greater heroines.

Like many of the books from this publisher, it is set up in bite sized chapters that you can read all at one or in snippets. Five purrs and two paws up.

“The great and almost only comfort about being a woman, is that one can always pretend to be more stupid than one is and no one is surprised.” – Dame Freya Stark.

Freya Stark is one of many explorers I want to know more about after reading this book. It covers about 50 different explorers – some ancient, some modern, including some involved in space exploration – in a series of potted biographies. I really liked the way it was laid out: each biography includes a picture of the explorer, some quotes from them, and a brief overview of their life, with extra detail on their adventures. Plenty of sources were given, and it’s easy enough to find more books about each individual person. Some of my favourites to read about were Emma Gatewood, Nellie Bly, Edmund Hillary and Sir John Franklin, and I especially appreciated the section on polar exploration as it’s one of my particular interests. This is a really nice book to dip into or read from beginning to end.

I’d like to thank the publisher, Pen & Sword, and Netgalley for kindly providing me with this advance release copy, I really appreciate it.