In the science fiction novel, The War of the Worlds, H.G. Wells explores the possibility of extra-terrestrial life and an alien invasion on earth. At the beginning of the novel the author says, “While men were busy with their various jobs, they were being closely observed and studied. It was done as narrowly as a man with a microscope observes creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water.
Men went about doing their work with perfect assurance and peace of mind. No one gave thought to the older worlds of space as sources of human danger. They dismissed the idea of life upon them as impossible. If they thought there was life on Mars, they thought of it as inferior to that on earth.
Yet, across the gulf of space, intellects cool and unsympathetic regarded the earth with jealous eyes. They were surely and slowly drawing their plans against us.”
The Martians invade the earth and unleash terror by using a weapon called the heat ray and a poisonous gas to destroy infrastructure and humans.
The novel is told in first person narrative by an unnamed narrator who describes his experience of the invasion. The Martians are destroyed by a pathogen which is a result of divine retribution. The novel tells a terrifying story of war unleashed by a savage and ruthless species, the Martians who try to destroy life on earth.