4 h 27 minAudiobook6 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 4 h 27 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if an angel lands in an English village—and finds ordinary human life stranger than another world?
Near Siddermorton, the Reverend Hilyer goes looking for a rare bird and shoots an angel by mistake. He brings the winged stranger into his vicarage and tries to care for him. In H. G. Wells's short comic fantasy, this visitor from a world of beauty and music must learn the rules of a place that has no room ready for him.
The village soon starts talking. Dr. Crump prefers a medical explanation to a marvel, while Delia, a poor, overlooked servant girl, offers plain kindness. As the angel questions money, manners, clothes and class, familiar customs begin to look absurd. Beneath the gentle jokes lies a sharper question: how do people treat beauty and kindness when they cannot understand them?
What you’ll discover
- An outsider's clear eyes See everyday human habits become strange through the angel's simple, searching questions.
- A village under scrutiny Watch Wells turn quiet village life into a comedy of manners and misunderstanding.
- Kindness without status Meet Delia, whose plain care offers the stranger something that social standing cannot.
- Music from another world Discover the angel's gift for music beyond anything the villagers have heard.
- Laughter with a soft heart Enjoy a dry, gentle voice that finds both absurdity and hidden beauty in human life.
Who will love it
For readers who love gentle satire, English village life, fantasy with a sting, and funny, kind stories about outsiders who see our habits for the first time.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A bird collector shoots an Angel instead
- Everything ordinary is new to the Angel
- The village tries to explain the Angel away
- The village shows the Angel its harsher side
- Music shows another world but society refuses it
- Beauty and kindness reach the Angel
- A comedy that is really about wonder
Who’s who
- The AngelA visitor from a world without pain, who falls into Siddermorton, learns hunger and hurt, and plays the violin with unearthly beauty.
- The Vicar, Mr HilyerA stout, absent-minded clergyman and bird collector who shoots the Angel by mistake and then shelters him, torn between belief and doubt.
- DeliaThe Vicarage housemaid, who feels sorry for the Angel because her elder sister is a cripple.
- Doctor CrumpThe village doctor, who trusts science above all and insists that the Angel is a curious case or a clever fraud.
- Mr MendhamThe Vicar's gaunt, bearded curate, who thunders about the great questions of the day and suspects the Vicar of scandal.
- Mrs MendhamThe curate's strong-willed wife, who trades gossip with Mrs Jehoram and is horrified by the Angel's first appearance on the lawn.
- Lady HammergallowThe deaf old owner of the village, who sets out to launch the Angel as a musical wonder.
- Sir John GotchThe local landowner whose treatment of a servant girl forms part of the Tramp's bitter account of village life.
Formats and delivery
- eBook
- On your phone, tablet, computer or Kindle, with the type as large as you like.
- Large-print eBook
- The same book in bigger, clearer type, from the first page.
- Audiobook
- 4 h 27 min, complete, read by Lucas Linden.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 6 minutes, to read or to hear.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
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Read and hear The Wonderful Visit in 25 languages and switch at any time. Or read two side by side, paragraph by paragraph: the way to learn a language with a book you love.
The Wonderful Visit
by H. G. Wells · 1895
A vicar with a gun shoots a strange bird on a hot afternoon and finds a wounded Angel in the bracken.
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In short
A hot August afternoon, a vicar with a gun, and a bird that is not a bird. In The Wonderful Visit, H.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A bird collector shoots an Angel instead
The story opens with a glare over Sidderford Moor and a burst of music that only a few villagers hear. The next day, witnesses report a huge bird with wings of flashing color. The Vicar of Siddermorton, Mr Hilyer, is an eager collector of rare birds, and he fears his rivals Gully and Borland will reach the creature first.
So he takes his gun after lunch and creeps through the bracken in Siddermorton Park. Something bright rises in front of him, and he fires from sheer habit. The victim falls screaming, and the Vicar finds a beautiful young man in a saffron robe, with wings that fade to dull gray as he lies in pain. The Angel first asks what has happened to him. When he notices the Vicar, he thinks he must be in the Land of Dreams.
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What is The Wonderful Visit about?
An English vicar who collects birds shoots what he thinks is a rare bird and finds an Angel. As the Angel learns human life, the village reacts with suspicion, snobbery and gossip, and the story shows how strange our habits look from outside.
Who is the Angel in The Wonderful Visit?
He is a young, winged visitor from a world of beauty without pain, who falls into Siddermorton. The villagers call him Mr Angel and treat him as a foreigner, a lunatic or a genius, while the Vicar half believes the truth.
Is The Wonderful Visit a comedy or a serious book?
It is both. The scenes of tea, tennis and village gossip are playful, while the Angel's discovery of pain, cruelty and class carries real feeling. Wells moves between laughter and tenderness throughout the story.
The author
H. G. Wells
1866–1946 · English science fiction novelist
H. G. Wells (1866–1946) was an English writer born in Bromley, Kent. He wrote novels, short stories and nonfiction. His novels included The Time Machine (1895), The Island of Doctor Moreau (1896), The Invisible Man (1897) and The War of the Worlds (1898). He died in London.
More by H. G. Wells
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