Allan Quatermain

King Solomon's Mines (1885) is a popular novel by the English Victorian adventure writer and fabulist Sir H. Rider Haggard. It tells of a search of an unexplored region of Africa by a group of adventurers led by Allan Quatermain for the missing brother of one of the party. It is the first English adventure novel set in Africa, and is considered to be the genesis of the "lost world" literary genre.

Famous elephant hunter Allan Quatermain is approached by Sir Henry Curtis to help him search for his brother who disappeared in the heart of Africa. When Allan accepts the job, little does he know that the quest for the missing man will drag him over mountains, through deserts, under ground and into the midst of a bloody war.

An instant best-seller when it was released in 1885, King Solomon’s Mines is regarded as one of the earliest works of “lost world” fiction in which explorers discover an unknown world full of adventure and mystery. In King Solomon’s Mines, adventurer Allan Quatermain sets out on an expedition to find a friend’s brother who was lost while searching for the mines of the biblical King Solomon. The mines are said to hold the riches and treasures of Solomon’s kingdom, a temptation that Quatermain cannot deny.

First published in 1885, with billboards and posters around London announcing "The Most Amazing Book Ever Written". It became an immediate best seller. The genesis of the Lost World literary genre! The search of an unexplored region of Africa by a group of adventurers, led by Allan Quatermain, for a missing brother, lost while searching for the mythical mines of King Solomon. It is the first English adventure novel set in Africa. The novel has been adapted to film at least six times.

King Solomon’s Mines is a variety of lost-world literature in what was one of the first English adventure novels that took place in Africa. It is told in a relatively rare first-person format. One story has stated that the author, H. Rider Haggard, wrote the book on a bet and that it took him only six weeks to do it.

Haggard wrote Allan Quatermain immediately after King Solomon's Mines. Quatermain is wearied with the traditional English lifestyle. He longs for the wilds of Africa. He convinces his friends Sir Henry Curtis and Captain John Good as well as the Zulu chief Umbopa to return to Africa in search of a fabled race of white people. Fierce Masai warriors, subterranean rivers, creatures from the deep, and a spectacular civil war are all in store for our seasoned adventurers. It's an adventure you won't want to miss!

We have met the intrepid hunter-tracker Allan Quatermain before, in H. Rider Haggard’s marvelous King Solomon’s Mines. This time, grieving from the tragic loss of his son, Quatermain longs to return to his beloved Africa. He sets out in search of a lost white tribe, the Zu-Vendis, ruled by two beautiful sister Queens. Once again, Quatermain’s companions are the indefatigable Sir Henry Curtis and Captain Good, and the magnificent Zulu warrior Umslopogaas. The journey is incredibly dangerous, and thrillingly told.

This sequel to King Solomon's Mines is filled with the spirit of adventure. Thrilled by rumors of a lost civilization, three Englishmen decide to travel to the heart of Africa with their Zulu guide where they meet with continual peril: an attack by a cruel warrior tribe, the scorch of underground volcanic fires, and an encounter with a huge species of ferocious black crab. Exhausted and depleted of supplies, the men at last arrive at a mysterious city in the highlands of the interior.

In this story, the heroic Allan Quatermain, the discoverer of King Solomon's Mines, returns to tell of another exciting episode from his life in deepest Africa. Pushed by his dining companions to relate the story of the mines, he instead tells them of a little matter concerning the loss of everything he owned and a near death experience.