"Great Voyages: Daring adventurers from James Cook to Gertrude Bell" by Deborah Patterson (British Library)

 A new book about some of history's greatest pioneering explorers? Oh yes, sign us up for sure!
The British Library has, as you'd expect, an uncanny knack for producing some truly glorious non-fiction titles for kids.

"Great Voyages: Daring Adventurers from James Cook to Gertrude Bell" by Deborah Patterson allows us to discover the world through the eyes of the greatest explorers in history.

Find out how the world was first circumnavigated by a slave and how travellers overcame the challenge of not having enough to eat and drink whilst travelling through unknown territory.

Experience the excitement of seeing a new land for the first time, tasting new fruits and discovering new animals.

From Marco Polo and Magellan to Shackleton and Armstrong, "Great Voyages" takes the reader on the most exhilarating and heroic journeys ever made.

This book focuses on fifteen key voyages from around the world: the journeys undertaken by Marco Polo, Ibn Battuta, Zheng He, Christopher Columbus, Ferdinand Magellan, Martin Frobisher, Francis Drake, Maria Sibylla Merian, Captain Cook, Lewis & Clark, Charles Darwin, David Livingstone, Gertrude Bell, Ernest Shackleton, and right through to the most amazing journey of all, chronicling the voyage of the astronauts who took part in the Moon landings.

Sumptuously illustrated with tons of maps, photos and information, this really is a fantastic book.

"Great Voyages: Daring Adventurers from James Cook to Gertrude Bell" by Deborah Patterson is out now, published by British Library (kindly supplied for review).