Treasure Island, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, and More Illustrated Classics

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Chomping at the bit to get someone you know into sci-fi? Better start with a novel that’s been capturing readers’ imaginations since the 1870s. In 20,000 Leagues, French marine biologist Pierre Aronnax, Canadian whaler and harpoonist Ned Land, and their assistant, Conseil, set sail to find a sea monster, but are instead captured by the enigmatic Captain Nemo, who imprisons them inside his futuristic, top-secret submarine, the Nautilus. The prisoners visit amazing places in the underwater world, both real and imagined, and have adventures ranging from shark hunting to being sucked into a whirlpool.

Treasure Island
When Jim Hawkins, the son of an innkeeper on the English coast in the mid-1700s, meets Billy “Bones” and discovers a map of Treasure Island, he sets into motion one of the most famous pirate adventures in history, boarding the Hispaniola and setting out to track down the treasure alongside some of fiction’s most memorable characters, including ship’s cook “Long John” Silver. But when Jim overhears Silver planning a mutiny, he’s forced to decide whom he can trust and how much courage he can muster to survive. The adventure that ensues is so iconic it practically created the myth of classic piracy, from an X marking the treasure on a map, to a one-legged bo’sun with a parrot on his shoulder.

Little Women
Are you a Jo, a Meg, a Beth, or an Amy? The sweeping family drama of the March sisters offers characters so compelling, almost everyone can identify with one of the four. The 19th-century tale begins with the March girls relishing small daily joys despite poverty and an absent father, and follows them as they grow, through times of sickness and of joy, through losses and the beginnings of their own families. It’s a profound and universal story that will never grow old, with a message of gratitude that leaves readers with a warm feeling. You’ll close the book smiling.

Anne of Green Gables
Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert, elderly siblings who own a farm called Green Gables, are surprised when they call for a servant boy and are mistakenly sent Anne Shirley, a redheaded female orphan. Though she’s one of our favorite classic protagonists—she’s spunky, inventive, cheerful, and outspoken—she’s also the opposite of what the Cuthberts were hoping for. Fortunately, after she shakes up the community and touches the hearts of everyone she meets, they decide to keep her. The story follows Anne as she challenges her friends, impresses her teachers, and becomes more to the Cuthberts than they ever imagined.

Black Beauty
Black Beauty is notable for being one of the first books to give an animal the autobiographical treatment. It follows a horse named Black Beauty through his early years on a farm, to his difficult life pulling cabs in London, to an eventual happy retirement in the country. Animal lovers of all ages will be pulled into this heartwarming story promoting kindness and humanity toward all species.

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
Disney magically recreated Alice in Wonderland in its 1951 animated classic, but the original book contains memorable characters and incredible scenes the film left out, like Pig and Pepper, the Mock Turtle and the Gryphon dancing to the Lobster Quadrille, and a trial where the Knave of Hearts is accused of stealing the Queen’s tarts. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland is proof that a book can truly take you somewhere else. Carroll invented one of the zaniest, most absurd, most linguistically playful worlds ever imagined, and made it one we’ll never forget.
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