FEATURED AUTHOR - Art Blegen is the author of “The Adventures of Kris”, a series of early middle-grade chapter books for young readers from six to ten years old. Each child is important, and each family matters to Art. He is an advocate for educating children and their parents to ensure they have a healthy balance of positive examples in their lives. Wholesome stories and a healthy imagination can lay the foundation they will use for the rest of their lives. Whether playing with his grandchildren or coaching…
Read more
Recent comments: User reviews
There are several drawbacks, which for me, spoiled the credibility of the idea somewhat, chief of which is that all the Martians landed within only a few miles of each other on this whole planet, even though they were fired here from some kind of large gun, at daily intervals. Surely an improbability, if not an impossibility? I'm not sure such an advanced species would be entirely ignorant of bacteria, that red weed would flourish and die so suddenly, or that the Martian sentinel would be unable to seek out the narrator when he was hiding in a coal cellar, by use of thermal vision or some such gadgetry, even with the Curate shouting.
That said, I found the book infinitely preferable to any of the movie versions. I was also amused by parallels in the Artilleryman's vision of the future - two types of people, one above ground, one underground - and those in The Time Machine. Wells must've strongly believed in this outcome for future generations? Strange...
The 1st, set in Belgium, is faintly amusing but rather overlong, complex and tiresome for what it is. The 2nd, about a clockmaker in Geneva, despite being livelier and having a decent moral is quite ridiculous. The 3rd is the shortest - a brief tale of a balloon ride - and possibly the most enjoyable. The 4th, the main Winter Amid The Ice story is rather depressing and somewhat unfulfilling of early promise. The last, by Paul Verne, about Mont Blanc is a very matter-of-fact account of someone making an early ascent, and was for me one of the better stories. Altogether a mixed bag of well-written but somewhat average stories.