Mysterious Phileas Fogg is a cool customer. A man of the most repetitious and punctual habit with no apparent sense of adventure whatsoever he gambles his considerable fortune that he can complete a journey around the world in just 80 days... immediately after a newspaper calculates the feat as just barely possible...

This is an adventure novel of the first water with wholly unexpected perils hair-breadth escapes brilliant solutions to insoluble problems and even a love story. And can this be? That he returns to London just five minutes too late to win his wager and retain his fortune?

The story starts in London on Tuesday October 1 1872. Fogg is a rich English gentleman and bachelor living in solitude at Number 7 Savile Row Burlington Gardens. Despite his wealth which is £40000 (roughly £3020000 today) Fogg whose countenance is described as "repose in action" lives a modest life with habits carried out with mathematical precision..