This work follows the adventures of a young English boy Charles Crusoe, the son of an English merchant in Bombay who is an admirer of Robinson Crusoe. This story follows the adventures of Charles when he is shipwrecked on his voyage home from Bombay and must learn to survive on his own until he is rescued.

Defoe occupies a central place in the history of English literature. As the author of Robinson Crusoe and Moll Flanders he can claim to be the creator of the first novels in English, and he was one of the earliest practitioners of the 'desert island' myth which has had such an influence on the human imagination. In A Journal of the Plague Year and A Tour through the Whole Island of Great Britain he forged a distinctive documentary style which deeply influenced later writers.