When penniless businessman Mr. Bedford retreats to the Kent coast to write a play, he meets by chance the brilliant Dr. Cavor, an absentminded scientist on the brink of developing a material that blocks gravity. Cavor soon succeeds in his experiments, only to tell a stunned Bedford that the invention makes possible one of the oldest dreams of humanity: a journey to the moon. With Bedford motivated by money, and Cavor by the desire for knowledge, the two embark on the expedition. But neither are prepared for what they find—a world of freezing nights, boiling days, and sinister alien life, in which they may be trapped forever.


First time in Penguin Classics Includes a newly established text, a full biographical essay on Wells, suggestions for further reading, and detailed notes

Herbert George Wells, better known as H. G. Wells, was the third son of a shopkeeper. After two years' apprenticeship in a draper's shop, he became a pupil-teacher at Midhurst Grammar School and won a scholarship to study under T. H. Huxley at the Normal School of Science, South Kensington. He taught biology before becoming a professional writer and journalist.

Wells is most famous today for his science fiction novels, of which the best known are: The Time Machine, The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man, The First Men in the Moon and The Island of Dr. Moreau. He was a prolific writer, writing more than a hundred books of both fiction and non-fiction, and works in many different genres, including contemporary novels, essays, histories, programmes for world regeneration, and social commentary. He was also an outspoken socialist. His later works become increasingly political and didactic, and only his early science fiction novels are still widely read today. Wells and Jules Verne are each sometimes referred to as "The Fathers of Science Fiction".