Okay, good adventure story that has been around for a long time. it's been made into several movies (none of which actually resemble the book all that much. For one thing, there's no heroine...at all. There's only two semi-main female characters in the entire book).

First, there are things in this book that will offend some readers. They are "unintentional" the book is a product of it's time, the late 1800s. The racial attitudes here are from that era and anyone picking up the book should be aware of that going in. There are a couple of things that I'm sure will be found offensive to many (and ironically so in some ways as the writer is actually "being racially liberal" for his day). If possible, forgive these dated faults and see the positive story that's here. But, no one can blame those who find the book too unpalatable to read. It's just the way it is.

Okay, that being said the story is imaginative and rolls along pretty reliably. The writing style holds up pretty well though there are times when it gets a bit tedious. Hang on it's just being a bit flowery and detailed. It picks back up.

There is a "slight" anticlimax tied into the ending but it's just used to tie up a dangling story thread. Again, not a bad thing.

So, be aware of the fact that there are some troubling 19th century racial stereotypes and read it for the story. Pretty good.