The War of the Worlds

The narrative chronicles the catastrophic invasion of Earth by technologically superior Martians, landing initially in Woking, Surrey. Through the eyes of an unnamed philosophical narrator, the text documents the systematic dismantling of Victorian military power and social order by the Martians' Heat-Rays and Black Smoke. The novel is bifurcated into two books: the first detailing the initial panic and the collapse of civilization, and the second focusing on the narrator's psychological endurance alongside the Curate and the Artilleryman in a ruined world. Simultaneously, the narrator's brother provides a panoramic view of the mass exodus from London, illustrating the fragility of societal structures. Ultimately, the Martians are defeated not by human ingenuity, but by terrestrial bacteria, exposing the biological vulnerability of the invaders and offering a humbling critique of anthropocentrism.