I've hit snag in my current reading. I've been trying to find some good high adventure novels, like Robert Louis Stevenson works (pirates, exploration, coming of age stories of young boys, etc....) but haven't had any luck. Can anyone recommend me some good works? I would greatly appreciate it.
There are fantastic anthologies of stories for boys. Tom Brown's Schooldays is good. I know they are kids books but Tales of Otori by Lian Hearne and recommend the Hardy Boys Casefiles and Undercover series
If you like High Fantasy you might enjoy the Legend of Drizzt series by R.A. Salvatore. Has plenty of adventure, some romance, a dragon or two, more adventure, and the characters can be alot of fun. I have enjoyed most of them. The chronoligical order starts with The Dark Elf Trilogy.
The Lies of Locke Lamora has coming-of-age and general adventure; the sequel, Red Seas Under Red Skies, has pirates. Both were wrtten by Scott Lynch. The Last Stormlord has coming-of-age, a certain amount of exploration, and raiders (not pirates, as the raiders are desert-dwellers, as are most of the characters).
"Bloody Jack" is about a 12-year-old girl who pretends to be a boy so she can be a hand on a ship; deals with pirates and coming of age issues.
Bloody Jack was really good. If anyone's looking for a similar type of story but with a female protagonist instead, I highly recommend the book Pirates! by Celia Rees.