3 ms·

HG Wells’s Forgotten Fiction

27 points by samclemens 7y ago

fiftyacorn 7y ago
I've been working my way through gutenberg books on the kindle - and included a few HG Wells. You forget how good "War of the Worlds" actually is as a novel Id also recommend PG Wodehouses books on Kindle like Jeeves and Wooster
devindotcom 7y ago
FYI this is mainly about Tono-Bungay, which you can download here: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/718 http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/718 Because of the name, I classed it among the Pacific adventure books like Mardi and Typee and so on. Apparently it's very different from what I thought. I also enjoyed The Food of the Gods, which takes an interesting and unexpected turn about halfway through. The First Men in the Moon is quite strange but a fun read.
- thrower123 7y ago
  The First Men in the Moon is part of that era of delightfully pulpy adventure and sci-fi novels. At one point I was on a Project Gutenberg kick, and the tail end of the pre-1923 public domain is a wonderful world of fantastical nonsense. Burroughs, H Rider Haggard, the Jules Verne back-catalog. It's so optimistic, a product of a world that was on the upswing and hopeful, where there were still blank spots on the map to fill in and science was moving in leaps and bounds. The shock of the Maxim gun and Krupp cannon murdered that brand of European optimism.
acabal 7y ago
You can read high quality ebook editions of some of the other novels mentioned here at Standard Ebooks: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/h-g-wells/ https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/h-g-wells/ We'd love help in producing more HG Wells works for people to read for free!
jostmey 7y ago
In 1913, HG Well's wrote about a major war ending in the use of atomic weapons. It would seem that some individuals truly are prophetic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Set_Free https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Set_Free
fernly 7y ago
I have a favorite in Wells' unknown back-catalog, the rom/com Wheels of Chance[1,2]. Wells really felt the pleasures of bicycling, but also understood (and took mischievous enjoyment in) the revolution it was creating in his society. For a cyclist it is great fun to have this glimpse of how the bicycle was seen shortly after its invention. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wheels_of_Chance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wheels_of_Chance (review/synopsis) [2] http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1264 http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1264
8bitsrule 7y ago
The short-story collections (one has 80) are well worth looking into! I recall several of his shorts as vividly as his bigger works. And here's the Wells section at Librevox: https://librivox.org/author/146 https://librivox.org/author/146

27 points by samclemens 7y ago

I've been working my way through gutenberg books on the kindle - and included a few HG Wells. You forget how good "War of the Worlds" actually is as a novel Id also recommend PG Wodehouses books on Kindle like Jeeves and Wooster

devindotcom 7y ago

FYI this is mainly about Tono-Bungay, which you can download here: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/718 http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/718 Because of the name, I classed it among the Pacific adventure books like Mardi and Typee and so on. Apparently it's very different from what I thought. I also enjoyed The Food of the Gods, which takes an interesting and unexpected turn about halfway through. The First Men in the Moon is quite strange but a fun read.

thrower123 7y ago
The First Men in the Moon is part of that era of delightfully pulpy adventure and sci-fi novels. At one point I was on a Project Gutenberg kick, and the tail end of the pre-1923 public domain is a wonderful world of fantastical nonsense. Burroughs, H Rider Haggard, the Jules Verne back-catalog. It's so optimistic, a product of a world that was on the upswing and hopeful, where there were still blank spots on the map to fill in and science was moving in leaps and bounds. The shock of the Maxim gun and Krupp cannon murdered that brand of European optimism.

acabal 7y ago

You can read high quality ebook editions of some of the other novels mentioned here at Standard Ebooks: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/h-g-wells/ https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/h-g-wells/ We'd love help in producing more HG Wells works for people to read for free!

jostmey 7y ago

In 1913, HG Well's wrote about a major war ending in the use of atomic weapons. It would seem that some individuals truly are prophetic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Set_Free https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_World_Set_Free

fernly 7y ago

I have a favorite in Wells' unknown back-catalog, the rom/com Wheels of Chance[1,2]. Wells really felt the pleasures of bicycling, but also understood (and took mischievous enjoyment in) the revolution it was creating in his society. For a cyclist it is great fun to have this glimpse of how the bicycle was seen shortly after its invention. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wheels_of_Chance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wheels_of_Chance (review/synopsis) [2] http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1264 http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/1264

8bitsrule 7y ago

The short-story collections (one has 80) are well worth looking into! I recall several of his shorts as vividly as his bigger works. And here's the Wells section at Librevox: https://librivox.org/author/146 https://librivox.org/author/146