The Invisible Man (Formatted Specifically for Kindle) Review
Imagine if you were invisible and could come and go as you pleased, with nobody able to see you. Cool, right? Well, not really. H.G. Wells' "The Invisible Man" has the sci-fi master exploring what would happen if a person took an invisibility elixir, and discovered too late that invisibility has some definite downsides. It's possibly Wells' funniest novel, but it also has some wonderfully chilling moments.
A strange man arrives at a hotel in Iping, wrapped up in goggles, bandages, scarves, and heavy clothes. He spends most of his time hidden away in his room, doing odd scientific experiments, and avoiding contact with other people -- while still keeping everything except his nose hidden. Meanwhile, the local vicar and his wife are robbed by a mysterious thief... who is completely invisible.
Well, you can guess what's up with the stranger -- he's an invisible man, and after a blowup with his landlady he reveals his true.... um, lack of appearance to the entire town. After a series of disastrous encounters, the Invisible Man encounters Dr. Kemp, an old friend to whom he reveals how he became invisible, and what he's done since then... as well as his malevolent plans for the future.
H.G. Wells isn't really known for being a funny writer, but the first part of "The Invisible Man" is actually mildly hilarious. He writes the first third or so of the book in a fairly light, humorous style, and there are some fun scenes speckled through the story, like a homeless man dealing with the Invisible Man ("Not a bit of you visible--except-- You 'aven't been eatin' bread and cheese?").
But things get much darker after Mr. Kemp enters the scene, and we find out that the Invisible Man is... well, kind of malevolent and crazy. Very crazy.
And as the plot grows darker and grimmer, Wells also inserts a clever (if far-fetched even by Victorian standards) explanation for how a person could become invisible, using a mix of science and fantasy. The plot hurtles through wild chase scenes and the occasional riot, and some moments of bleak tension ("When dawn came to mingle its pallor with the lamp-light and cigar smoke of the dining-room, Kemp was still pacing...")
The Invisible Man himself (aka Griffin) is a pretty mysterious character for most of the story, since all we know about him is that he's invisible.... and also kind of a jerk. I mean, the guy constantly flies off the handle and even robs a nice little old vicar. And the more we find out about him, the more malignant and insane he turns out to be.
Even if you had a way to become invisible, "The Invisible Man" would be a pretty effective way of dissuading people from using it. A deserving classic.
The Invisible Man (Formatted Specifically for Kindle) Overview
H.G. Wells' timeless classic of The Invisible Man is now available on the Kindle platform with all of the features you would expect in the print version.
This Kindle edition features a linked table of contents so that you can quickly and easily navigate through the content.
The content of this edition is formatted in such a way as to be readable regardless of your personal text or line size settings.
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Customer Reviews
Invisibility as a Result of Science - Rune Rindel Hansen - Copenhagen, Denmark
H.G. Wells was a scientific man. He wrote this book in the burgeoning scientific society (The book is published in 1897), which was to transform the entire world in the 20.th century. H.G. Wells was acutely curious about the most far reaching possiblities of science. This book actually ponders upon a scientific theory about making matter invisible. According to this theory matter is visible because it is granulated. Wells gives an example with glass: When glass is whole it is transparent and you can look through it. If you break the class and crushes it into a powder, you granulate the glass and makes it into a white powder, which is not transparent. It is the uneven surfaces of the granules which makes them non-transparent. If you can smoothen these surfaces of the granules you can make matter more transparent. Wells gives an example with paper. We can't look through paper because it is made of tiny paper fragments with uneven surfaces. But if you poor oil on the paper it has the effect of smoothening the jagged surfaces of the paper fragments making up the piece of paper, thus the paper is becoming more transparent. This is fundamentals of the theory which the scientist of the novel, Griffin, uses to make himself invisible.
Okay. - L. R. Nguyen - Orlando, FL
Not really what I was expecting but now I can at least say I read it.
ehhhhh - J. Anderson - Upper Midwest
I expected this story to be similar to Frankenstein or Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde but it wasn't. In those two books the researchers/scientists struggled with the morals of their work. The story revolved around the struggle of IF they should have done what they did and the results of their actions.
The Invisible Man could have been titled The Violent Man. It basically followed the events of Griffin who, while invisible, hurts, burns, and kills people at every turn. There really was no story, lesson, moral or point.
I do give kudos to Wells in that his fight scenes were very well written.
*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Sep 02, 2010 15:31:04
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