The Begum's Fortune

Blurb

The Begum's Fortune, also published as The Begum's Millions, is an 1879 novel by Jules Verne, with some elements which could be described as utopian and others which seem clearly dystopian. It is remarkable as the first published book in which Verne was cautionary and to some degree pessimistic about the development of science and technology.
As came out long after the book's publication, it is actually based on a manuscript by Paschal Grousset, a Corsican revolutionary who had participated in the Paris Commune and was at the time living in exile in the USA and London. It was bought by Pierre-Jules Hetzel, the publisher of most of Verne’s books. The attribution of plot elements between Grousset's original text and Verne's work on it has not been completely defined. Later, Verne worked similarly on two more books by Grousset and published them under his name, before the revolutionary finally got a pardon and was able to return to France and resume publication in his own name.