aîné J.-H. Rosny jeune J.-H. Rosny 1 hr 2 min read

In prehistoric times, a nomadic tribe encounters the Xipéhuz, luminous, geometric, utterly alien beings that kill any human who nears, and must find a way to fight the incomprehensible.

The Rosny brothers' 1887 'The Xipéhuz' is a landmark of first-contact fiction, one of the earliest tales of a truly alien intelligence. Visionary, stark, foundational. Read it for a startlingly modern story of humanity's war against beings we can barely perceive, in French.

In its time

Published in 1887, during the 1880s, lost races and dying earths.

Reading it

1 hr 2 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).