H. G. Wells

"When massive, intelligent aliens from Mars touch down in Victorian England and threaten to destroy the civilized world, humanity's vaunted knowledge proves to be of little use. First published in 1898, H. G. Wells's masterpiece of speculative fiction has thrilled and delighted generations of readers, spawned countless imitations, and inspired dramatizations by such masters as Orson Welles and Steven Spielberg. The War of the Worlds is a fantasy that...

"Adrift in a dinghy, Edward Prendick, the single survivor from the good ship Lady Vain, is rescued by a vessel carrying a profoundly unusual cargo - a menagerie of savage animals. Nursed to recovery by the keeper Montgomery, who gives him dark medicine that tastes of blood, Prendick soon finds himself stranded upon an uncharted island in the Pacific with his rescuer and the beasts. Here, he meets Montgomery's master, the sinister Doctor Moreau - a...

A chemist's life is transformed by the wonders of selling snake oil in this satire of early–twentieth century capitalism by the author of The Time Machine. As a young assistant chemist, George Ponderevo rode his uncle's coattails to a great fortune. His uncle Edward's meteoric rise was all thanks to a miraculous patent medicine, Tono-Bungay-which George knew to be nothing more than sugar water. Though it provided none of its promised curative...

A comet rushes toward the earth, a deadly, glowing orb that soon fills the sky and promises doom. But mankind is too busy hating, stealing, scheming, and killing to care. As luminous green trails of cosmic dust and vapor stream across the heavens, blood flows beneath: nations wage all-out war, bitter strikes erupt, and jealous lovers plot revenge and murder. The earth slips past the comet by the narrowest of margins, but all succumb to the gases in...

Having coined the phrase "the war that will end war," H. G. Wells was disillusioned by the World War I peace settlement. Convinced that humanity needed to awaken to the instability of the world order and remember lessons from the past, the author of numerous science fiction classics set out to write about history. Wells hoped to remind mankind of its common past, provide it with a basis for international patriotism, and guide it to renounce war. The...

When a turn-of-the-century scientist builds a time machine, his perilous journey into the far distant future leads to the discovery of a strange and terrifying new world.

Through his fiction, H.G. Wells transformed some of the most pressing social, political, and cultural issues of his day-class struggle, colonial imperialism, nation building, uncontrolled scientific experimentation-into the raw material of brilliant speculative fables. The six novels collected in The War of the Worlds and Other Science Fiction Classics were all written at the turn of the twentieth century, and with them Wells helped to lay the foundations...

Satiric vision of war and big business.

"An intrepid adventurer, known simply as the Time Traveler, meets his friends for dinner one night. During the conversation, he baffles them with his wild ideas about moving forward or backward in time. His claims are met with disbelief. Even when he proves his theory with a real-life experiment, his associates simply claim that he is a trickster--a magician. A week later, he enthralls his acquaintances yet again. He tells a story so unbelievable...

The complete science fiction treasury of H. G. Wells.