The Kraken Wakes
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The Kraken Wakes

Cover of first edition (hardcover)
Author John Wyndham
Country United Kingdom
Language English
Genre(s) Science fiction novel
Publisher Michael Joseph
Publication date July 1953
Media type Print (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages 288 pp
ISBN N/A
Preceded by The Day of the Triffids
Followed by The Chrysalids
The Kraken Wakes is an apocalyptic science fiction novel by John Wyndham, originally published by Michael Joseph in the UK in 1953 and first published in the US in the same year by Ballantine Books under the title Out of the Deeps as a mass market paperback. The title is a reference to Alfred Tennyson's sonnet The Kraken, which describes a Scandinavian sea monster.
[]Plot

The novel describes escalating phases of what appears to be an alien invasion; as told - with quite a bit of wry humour, even when describing manifestly non-humorous situations - through the eyes of Mike Watson, who works for the fictional EBC (English Broadcasting Company), and his wife and co-worker Phyllis. A major role is also played by Professor Alastair Bocker - more clear-minded and far-sighted about the developing crisis than everybody else, but with the habit of telling the public far more than they are capable of absorbing at a given moment.
Mike and Phyllis tend to witness the major events, such as they are, but there are no heroic deeds of a mankind fighting for survival. Unlike in H.G. Wells' "War of the Worlds", to which an explicit comparison is made in the first chapter, it takes years before humans realize at all that their world has been invaded.
In the first phase, objects from outer space land in the oceans. Mike and Phyllis happen to see five of the "meteors" falling into the sea, from the ship where they are sailing on their honeymoon - an exciting moment for everyone on board, but nobody realizes that they have witnessed the beginning of an invasion from space. Eventually the distribution of the objects' landing points - always at ocean deeps, never on land - implies intelligence. (An intelligence which is, obviously, interested especially in ocean deeps.)
It is suggested in the early parts that conflict may not have been inevitable. The aliens appear to come from a gas giant, and can only survive under conditions of extreme pressures in which humans would be instantly crushed. The deepest parts of the oceans are the only parts of Earth in any way useful to them, and they have no need or use for the dry land or even the shallower parts of the seas. In theory, the two species could have co-existed indefinitely, hardly noticing each other's presence.
However, humans are nevertheless disturbed and feeling threatened by this new phenomenon on their world - particularly since the newcomers show signs of intensive work to adapt the ocean deeps to their needs, and there are even indications of their digging a tunnel deep underground to connect the Atlantic and the Pacific, in effect their own version of the Panama Canal.
A British bathysphere is sent down to investigate, and is destroyed by the aliens. The British government reacts rashly and rather unwisely - as remarked by protagonists at the time - by exploding a nuclear device on the spot, under the guise of "testing" it (an act not yet forbidden, at the time the book was written, by the Test Ban Treaty).
As it turns out, the aliens have many more means of getting at the humans than the other way around. Moreover, humanity is not united in the face of the mounting threat - the Cold War between West and East is at its height, with the two sides often suspiciously attributing the effects of the alien attacks to their human opponents.
Phase two of the war starts with ships being attacked, causing havoc to world shipping, and the British are humbled to realize "how easily we have been driven off the oceans" (the book was written at the time when, in real life, they had to get used to no longer being an empire). Shortly after, the aliens start 'harvesting' the land by sending up 'sea tanks' which capture humans from seaside settlements, for reasons that are never made clear. The fate of those captured is equally unexplained, but in the Western world, the focus of the narrator, the attacks were eventually met with retaliation so that "...their percentage of losses mounted and their returns diminished".
In the final phase, Phase Three, the aliens begin melting the ice caps, causing sea levels to rise. London and other ports are gradually flooded, causing widespread social and political collapse. The same happens in many other countries - for example, the Dutch flee the Netherlands when it becomes clear that they had "...lost their centuries-old struggle with the sea".
The story follows the journalist couple Mike and Phyllis Watson, as they cover this story of the alien attacks for the English Broadcasting Company - which they do until the radio (and organized social and political life in general) cease to exist - whereupon they can only try to survive and understand what is going on.
At the end, humanity (specifically, the Japanese) develops an underwater ultrasonic weapon that kills the aliens. However, the world population has been reduced to less than a fifth of its level before these events.
Throughout the book the aliens remain unseen; everything we know about them is inferred from their actions. The most that is learned is that, once they have been killed, "large masses of organic jelly" float to the surface of the sea.
[]External links

Review by Jo Walton, including comments on other cozy catastrophes.
[]Bibliography

Wyndham, John. The Kraken Wakes (London: Michael Joseph, 1953) —First edition.
Wyndham, John. Out of the Deeps (New York: Ballantine, 1953) —First US edition.
Wyndham, John. The Kraken Wakes (London: Penguin, 1955) —First Penguin edition.
Wyndham, John. The Kraken Wakes (London: Penguin, 1970) ISBN 0-14-001075-0
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Works by John Wyndham
Novels
Foul Play Suspected · The Secret People · Stowaway to Mars · The Day of the Triffids · The Kraken Wakes · The Chrysalids · The Midwich Cuckoos · The Outward Urge · Trouble with Lichen · Chocky · Web
Short stories
"Consider Her Ways" · "Random Quest"
Short story collections
Jizzle · The Seeds of Time · Tales of Gooseflesh and Laughter · Consider Her Ways and Others · The Infinite Moment · Sleepers of Mars · The Best of John Wyndham · Wanderers of Time · Exiles on Asperus · No Place like Earth
Film adaptations
The Day of the Triffids · Village of the Damned (1960) · Quest For Love · Village of the Damned (1995)
Radio adaptations
Chocky · The Day of the Triffids · The Chrysalids · The Kraken Wakes · The Midwich Cuckoos
TV adaptations
The Day of the Triffids (1981 TV series) · Chocky · Random Quest · Consider Her Ways · The Day of the Triffids (2009 TV series)
Book adaptations
The Night of the Triffids
Categories: 1953 novels | Apocalyptic fiction | Science fiction novels | Novels by John Wyndham