The Kraken Wakes

by John Wyndham

Paperback, 240 pages

English language

Published June 10, 1980 by Penguin.

ISBN:: 978-0-14-001075-6

(17 reviews)

It started with fireballs raining down from the sky and crashing into the oceans' deeps. Then ships began sinking mysteriously and later 'sea tanks' emerged from the deeps to claim people . . .For journalists Mike and Phyllis Watson, what at first appears to be a curiosity becomes a global calamity. Helpless, they watch as humanity struggles to survive now that water – one of the compounds upon which life depends – is turned against them. Finally, sea levels begin their inexorable rise . . .The Kraken Wakes is a brilliant novel of how humankind responds to the threat of its own extinction and, ultimately, asks what we are prepared to do in order to survive.

12 editions

Ian Brown reviewed Kraken Wakes by John Wyndham

C'est toujours l'écroulement.

5 stars

Content warning Mild spoiler alert. Read the book first. It is a good one.

A fantastic (and perhaps prescient) account of the end of the world. Aliens or climate change, the ultimate cause of our doom will be the limits on our ability as a species to rise above the limits of our humanity. As with any good apocalypse story some aspects of humanity are quickly disposed of, just not the ones needed to carry the day.