In 1863, Jules Verne (1828-1905) published Five Weeks in a Balloon, and struck a new vein in fiction - stories that combined popular science and exploration. He wrote 54 novels in the Extraordinary Voyages series. Michael Glencross, the translator, has written widely on French literature and culture.Brian Aldiss is a distinguished Science Fiction writer as well as a poet, essayist, dramatist, SF historian and critic. His lastest work is Super-State: A Novel of Future Europe (2002).

“The reason Verne is still read by millions today is simply that he was one of the best storytellers who ever lived.”—Arthur C. Clarke