Oh, don’t misunderstand me. When I say “try as I might,” I mean that I work through one or two in the pantheon a year. But many of them do feel like work, not pleasure.
Another author that has worked well for me in the past, and serves as one of the great founding fathers of science fiction, is Jules Verne. I especially enjoy 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. Sorry I can’t point you to any particular “good” translation.
If you’re interested in influential works which are unlikely to pop up in a “serious Literature course”, take a look at Dumas Father (The Three Musketeers, The Count of Monte Cristo) or at Walter Scott (Ivanhoe - yes, Scott pops up but in folklore courses, or in Lit courses with other works) as examples of the kind of adventure novels from the Romantic period which eventually became today’s Fantasy genre.
Jules Verne has several non-sci-fi adventure novels (Miguel Strogoff or Around the World in 80 Days, for example) as well as the Science Fiction ones. My own favorite for him on the “scientific fantasy” genre is From the Earth to the Moon. I found 20,000 a bit too heavy, but then, last time I read the whole collection I was 12, you’re old enough to vote 