Book excerpt: Edgar Wallace enjoyed writing science fiction. "Planetoid 127", first published in 1929 but reprinted as late 1962, is a short story about an Earth scientist who communicates via wireless with his counterpart on a duplicate Earth orbiting unseen because it is on the opposite side of the Sun. The idea of a mirror Earth or mirror Universe later became a standard subgenre within science fiction. The story also bears similarities to Rudyard Kipling's hard science fiction story "Wireless". Wallace's other science fiction works include "The Green Rust", a story of bio-terrorists who threaten to release an agent that will destroy the world's corn crops, "1925", which accurately predicted that a short peace would be followed by a German attack on England, "The Black Grippe", which is about a disease that renders everyone in the world blind, and The Sodium Lines; or, The Day the World Stopped._x000D_ Edgar Wallace (1875-1932) was an English writer. As well as journalism, Wallace wrote screen plays, poetry, historical non-fiction, 18 stage plays, 957 short stories and over 170 novels, 12 in 1929 alone. More than 160 films have been made of Wallace's work._x000D_ This edition includes:_x000D_ Planetoid 127_x000D_ The Green Rust_x000D_ 1925 - The Story of a Fatal Peace_x000D_ The Black Grippe_x000D_ The Day the World Stopped