The War of the Worlds
H. G. Wells
Read by LibriVox Volunteers
H. G. Wells wrote The War of the Worlds in 1898, when there was much speculation about life on the planet Mars. The book is considered to be one of the first science fiction novels. In the story, an English gentleman narrates the events of a violent and fast paced Martian invasion.
The frightening images of people fleeing from gigantic tripod machines and the prospect of life under Martian rule have served as a bottomless well of inspiration for popular culture. The novel has served as a template for many derivative or inspired works, including comics, countless books, a TV series, several films, a bestselling musical, and the famous Orson Wells broadcast. Overall, The War of the Worlds has become an early milestone in and inspiration for the invasion genre.
The novel demonstrates Wells' typical pessimistic outlook on human nature and offers a good deal of criticism on society and people's ignorance and vanity. The War of the Worlds can be read as an indictment of European colonial actions around the globe at that time - with which the injustice of the Martian invasion can be compared. Wells has since been credited with predicting quite a number of technologies, such as laser-like rays, industrial robot-like machines, and chemical-warfare.
(Summary by Stephan Möbius and Annie Coleman)
Illustrations by Stephan Möbius
Book 1 - Chapter 1: Map of Surrey
Book 1 - Chapter 5: The Cylinder Opens - 1, The Cylinder Opens - 2
Book 1 - Chapter 11: In the Storm
Book 1 - Chapter 12: At the Window
Book 1 - Chapter 16: What Had Happened in Surrey
Book 1 - Chapter 17: The Exodus from London
Book 2 - Chapter 2: Under Foot (6 hr 43 min)
Chapters
Reviews
it was a chilling listen. great for the heat😆
Mezz
I started listening to this one sunday when I had committed to cleaning the bathroom in its entirety. (classy sentence structure😎) but for reals I wanted to focus on getting the bathroom cleaned up and this helped focus and motivaite me because it was a very interesting listen. classics like this are pretty easy to dismiss as old and boring, but often times when I've read or listened to old favorites like this, I find they were popular for a good reason. There are several different ppl making the recordings for this but I didnt find it to be overly distracting and each narrator has a clear tone. so yeah I'd say its a good listen. recommended🖒
Disappointed
A LibriVox Listener
I was so looking forward to listen to this book since I found the book so interesting years ago. Normally you get into a rhythm with the person reading, not with this book, it made very difficult to relate to main character having different people reading each chapter. It was very disappointing.
Visionary genius!
Sandyjeans
I've read q lot of scifi over the years and the bulk of futuristic books are comparatively far fetched. Wells, while written as taking place current to his time, presents the possibilities of advanced races having what has since proven to be possible and in many cases is in current use. How could he have envisioned our current progress while living in the 19th century? His visions bring to mind DaVinci.
Eruption
Raser Apps
Story is amazing but as usual librivox destroys any literary beauty by allowing different readers for each chapter. Chapter 2 was as far as I got. I was trying to drift off but the reader erratically bursts into high volume and pitch at different points of every sentence. Try it with headphones. Made my eyes nearly pop out every few seconds. Shame because I was really looking forward to this one.
FANTASTIC
Lel
I took Avid Readers advice and listened to this over several nights in bed in the dark. Yes, some of the readers were not as good as others but the entire book was fantastic. Will probably listen to it in the dark again when I have run out of other books to listen to. I think H.G. Wells would have loved this version.
Excellent Set of Readers
l.Ridenour
Thoroughly enjoyed this book particularly, I feel, because of the variety of readers. Each reader having a distinct accent and often peculiar pronunciation (especially in the case of Stephen M. who is not a native English speaker, but who's accent adds an elegant touch, and a truly other-worldliness to his chapters) makes for a lively production of this awesome tale.
Oldie but Goodie book
Michael Vandeventer
Having only seen the movies and heard about the radio program I thought I knew the story. I was mistaken. Incredible story based in old London and surrounding area which is nothing like the movies or radio program. Readers do a great job with different ones on just about every chapter. I highly recommend this book!
thank you everyone!!
John Mullins
what a gift. i enjoyed all the readers. for me it felt like we were seeing and hearing the invasion from many different perspectives. this is what librivox is all about. thank you everyone. most surprising to me are scenes of enormous energy and pulse racing action, so long after it was first published.