The Man Who Fell to Earth

By: Walter Tevis

Narrated by: George Guidall

The basis for a feature film starring David Bowie in his first major role, The Man Who Fell to Earth tells the story of Thomas Jerome Newton, an alien disguised as a human who comes to Earth on a mission to save his people. Devastated by nuclear war, his home planet, Anthea, is no longer habitable. Newton lands in Kentucky and starts patenting Anthean technology, amassing the fortune he needs to build a spaceship that will bring the last 300 Anthean survivors to Earth.

But instead of the help he seeks, he finds only self-destruction, sinking into alcoholism, abandoning his spaceship, and can save neither his people nor himself. This is the poignant story of a man fallen to addiction, materialism, and loneliness.

"Beautiful science fiction … [Newton] acquires a moving, tragic force as the stranger, caught and destroyed in a strange land … The story of an extraterrestrial visitor from another planet is designed mainly to say something about life on this one."—The New York Times

©1963 Walter Tevis (P)1990 Recorded Books

Better than the movie

I was a teen when the movie came out, and I liked it, though it was slow. But of course the book has a lot more depth.

Adored it

It was a fantastic story, no major tail spinning stuff happens, however, the personal tale is quite fantastic! Definite read for people who enjoy a fish out of water story, or relate to feeling alien from the majority of the population!

Essential prelude to Showtime series.

Marvelous story. Visionary for its time. A sympathetic portrayal of a superior species. Read it!

The ingenuity of the Anthian

I liked reading about how a person from outer space adapted to human life and learning his perspective of humans.

One of the best sci-fi books I've ever read

The Man Who Fell to Earth was original, creative, and moving. Walter Tevis is a creative force on a parallel with Philip K. Dick.

the solicitud

The ending was surprisingly fitting and it makes this book more human in a story about aliens.

Another Apocalyptic Literature Entry

Overall I have a real fondness for George Guidall as a performer and he does an excellent job here. Rather than give Thomas Newton a distinct voice he instead gives him a stilted cadence to his speech, really smart take on the material.

As far as the story is concerned I liked it a lot for a while but it gets both extremely cynical and extremely hopeful at the same time and then crashes into cynicism so fast an so hard. I don't want to spoil anything, but it is a downer ending and it borders on being mean spirited in that regard.

There is a sort of sub-genre of near messiah alien figures that have come to save Earth and then Earthlings just bungle it, this is one of those I guess, but there is no real message? I don't really get the moral message here other than, "I guess we are doomed."

There is also a weird incongruity in here. The story was written in 1963? But in the last 3rd of the book Watergate is mentioned by name along with the "Presidents still use the FBI and CIA to spy on their political opponents." Was there some revision to the text at some point? If they mentioned it in the forward then it must have slipped from my mind.

Gr8!

Great story. Thought provoking, and interesting characters, with an easy flow
To capture you attention. Not to technical but visionary.

better than 3, not as good as 4 stars

It's not a bad story, it starts off better than it ends. It's somewhat dated. Guidall is always a great reader.

Classic scifi

A brilliant and kind of heartbreaking story—different from the movie and the series. And George Guidell fans will enjoy it!