The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth

This unabridged edition of The Food of the Gods and How it Came to Earth by H.G. Wells includes: Annotations An introductory note by the editor A brief biography of the author The body of this edition's text has not been abridged and is true to the form it took in 1904. All contributions by the editor are intended to make the book more accessible to the modern reader without resorting to alteration. In this, one of H.G. Wells’ wittiest novels, two scientists bring about a crisis of gigantic proportions when they invent a substance that accelerates growth in all organisms that consume it. They mean to start by experimenting in a controlled way with chickens, but pretty soon they find themselves contending with wolf-sized rats, eagle-sized wasps and worse. This amusing but thought-provoking satire was originally released by instalments as a serial story before its eventual publication in novel form in 1904. The experienced reader of H.G. Wells will find that this book is populated by many of the writer’s favourite themes and attitudes, making for a read that is at once both light with humour and heavy with meaning. ~ ~ ~ The mission of Integrity Reprint Publishing (IRP) is inspired by a crisis of quality that presently frustrates the market for reprints of public domain books. The internet is flooded with an absolute glut of poor reprints that are affordable (though not necessarily cheap) and promise to provide the purchaser with a respectable modern copy of an old book. The consumer’s trust is all too often rewarded with something inexcusably shabby. Issues with these uploaded, print-on-demand books range from bad formatting to the book being nothing more than a photocopy of some antique original. The response of this house is to make use of the same avenues used by these “publishers” and produce respectable, tidy copies of books that strike the editors as being worthy of reprinting. IRP is not the only publisher releasing quality reprints, but it is the hope of the editors that IRP will be able to join those existing houses in creating a clear delineation on the internet book market between books worthy of the reader’s coin and those that are best consigned to ignominy. These editions are intended to fulfil an ambassadorial role between the writings of yore and the 21st century reader. All supplemental materials contributed (annotations, author’s bio, introductory letters, &c.) are intended to make the work more accessible while maintaining a low, humble profile. It is the belief of this staff that the books selected by IRP for publication need only be given a good, clean stage to shine on their own.