A biography of the English author whose interest in science and social reform greatly influenced the basic themes of his work.

"When H.G. Wells left school in 1880 at the age of thirteen he looked destined for obscurity. Defying expectations, he went on to become one of the most famous writers in the world, remaining active into the era of the atomic bomb, which he had predicted thirty years earlier. Along the way he created classic science-fiction tales such as The Time Machine, The Invisible Man and The War of the Worlds, reinvented the Dickensian novel in Kipps and The History of Mr Polly, pioneered postmodernism in experimental fictions such as Tono-Bungay and harangued his contemporaries in a series of left-liberal polemics which included two bestselling histories of the world." "He brought equal energy to his love life, outrageously promiscuous even by the standards of today. A series of often overlapping affairs embraced distinguished authors such as Dorothy Richardson and Rebecca West, daughters of friends, the gun-toting travel writer Odette Keun and the Russian spy Moura Budberg. Wells had many artis