Jules Verne · 1876 · overland

One of Jules Verne's most thrilling adventures, the journey of the Tsar's courier Michael Strogoff, sent in secret from Moscow to Irkutsk to warn the Grand Duke of a Tatar invasion and the treachery of Ivan Ogareff. Across five thousand versts of war-torn Siberia, by rail, river, horse and on foot, Strogoff endures capture, blinding and betrayal to carry his message to the far edge of the empire.

1. 1
   Moscow

   In the Tsar's palace at Moscow, word comes that the Tatar hordes of Feofar-Khan have risen across Siberia and cut the telegraph, and that the traitor Ivan Ogareff means to betray the Grand Duke isolated at Irkutsk. The Tsar entrusts his finest courier, Michael Strogoff, with a secret letter and an impossible errand: carry it five thousand versts across a war-torn continent, by any means and at any cost.

2. 2
   Nizhny Novgorod

   Travelling as the humble merchant Nicholas Korpanoff, Strogoff takes the train east to Nizhny Novgorod, where the great fair is breaking up in alarm at the news from the east. Here he meets Nadia, a young woman journeying to her exiled father in Siberia, and the two agree to travel on together as brother and sister.

3. 3
   Perm

   By steamer down the Volga to Kazan and on toward the Urals, Strogoff and Nadia press east as the frontier closes behind them. At Perm, the last city of European Russia, the railways and the easy roads give out, and ahead lie the mountains and the vast wild country where the courier must trust to horses, carts, and his own endurance.

4. 4
   Yekaterinburg

   Crossing the Ural Mountains, the dividing line between Europe and Asia, Strogoff passes into Siberia and the teeth of the danger. In a tarantass hurtling through a violent storm he first crosses paths with his enemies, and the long road to Irkutsk becomes a running duel with the Tatar advance and the treachery of Ogareff.

5. 5
   Omsk

   The road leads to Omsk, the courier's own home town, where his aged mother Marfa still lives. Forbidden by his mission to acknowledge her, Strogoff is undone when she sees and names him before the Tatars; his disguise in tatters, he is taken prisoner as the invading army sweeps across the steppe toward the great rivers.

6. 6
   Tomsk

   At the Tatar camp near Tomsk, Strogoff is dragged before Feofar-Khan and condemned. By the cruelest of the conqueror's customs he is blinded, a red-hot blade passed before his eyes, and left for dead, though Nadia finds him and will not leave his side as the two set out once more, on foot and all but helpless, for the still-distant Irkutsk.

7. 7
   Krasnoyarsk

   Across the Yenisei at Krasnoyarsk they struggle on, sheltered and guided by strangers, the sightless courier carrying his message still locked in his memory. Behind them the Tatar columns roll east; ahead, the river Angara and the besieged city where the Grand Duke waits, unwarned, for the blow Ogareff is preparing to deliver from within.

8. 8
   Irkutsk

   Down the burning Angara, its surface aflame with blazing oil, Strogoff reaches Irkutsk at the eleventh hour. He unmasks the traitor Ogareff, delivers at last the Tsar's letter, and saves the city and the Grand Duke; and it is revealed that grief and will had spared his sight after all, so that the courier can look once more upon Nadia, who becomes his wife.