In this bestselling novel by the authors of THE MOTE IN GOD'S EYE, a massive comet breaks apart and bombards the Earth, with catastrophic results: worldwide earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, thousand-foot tidal waves and seemingly endless rain… With civilization in ruins, individuals band together to survive and to build a new society. "A MEGATON OF SUSPENSEFUL EXCITEMENT ... which should keep readers going non-stop, cover to cover" - Booklist.

"A work in the grand tradition ... even the miracle of Sensurround may be inadequate to convey all the imaginative reverberations."
- Los Angeles Times

"A 'Disaster' thriller of rare quality ... for its expertise and the scale of its apocalypse ... Strings out the suspense almost unbearably." 
- John Barkham Reviews

"The first satisfying end-of-the-world novel in years ... an ultimate one ... massively entertaining."
- Cleveland Plain-Dealer

"Take your earthquakes, waterlogged condominiums, swarms of bugs, colliding airplanes and flaming what-nots, wrap them up and they wouldn't match one page of LUCIFER'S HAMMER for sweaty-palmed suspense."
- Chicago Daily News

**

From the Publisher

I think this is one of the most exciting, inspiring books I've ever read. Humankind, faced with overwhelming cataclysm, regroups to fight its way back to civilization. All the way back; no settling for another uncomfortable, time-wasting Dark Age. It is a story with brain and heart--and a lot of both--and I can't figure how it missed that list of the hundred best books of the century.

--Veronica Chapman, Senior Editor

From the Inside Flap

The gigantic comet had slammed into Earth, forging earthquakes a thousand times too powerful to measure on the Richter scale, tidal waves thousands of feet high. Cities were turned into oceans; oceans turned into steam. It was the beginning of a new Ice Age and the end of civilization. But for the terrified men and women chance had saved, it was also the dawn of a new struggle for survival--a struggle more dangerous and challenging than any they had ever known....
"Massively entertaining."
CLEVELAND PLAIN-DEALER