An enormous, mysterious box descends upon small-town Minnesota, spelling trouble for the world, in this classic adventure from a Science Fiction Grand Master.

Forestry student Jerry Conklin is fly-fishing when something huge lands on his car, crushing it into the earth. It looks like a big black box-about fifty feet high and two hundred feet long-and the object stirs up quite a commotion among the townspeople of Lone Pine, Minnesota. One of them even shoots at it-and quickly pays for it with his life.

Around the country, people scramble to determine what exactly the box is. Is it a machine? Or maybe a sentient being? What does it want? They have no way of knowing.

Jerry, meanwhile, has firsthand knowledge after the visitor abducts him. Then, just as he discovers it is a living, intelligent creature, it releases him into the darkness of night.

As Jerry searches for a way back to civilization, more visitors descend upon Earth. They seem harmless enough. Then they begin eating trees, and that's only the beginning . . .