The Wrecks of Time

Originally serialised in New Worlds 1965-66. First book edition in 1967.

Also known as The Rituals of Infinity (1971).

Outside time, outside space, the planets hung in limbo.

One was all desert, one covered in freshwater oceans, one in grey volcanic dust. Jungle covered another. Fifteen planets in all, each called Earth and each under threat.

Once upon a time there had been twenty-four alternate Earths, all similar, but one by one they had broken down in space dust and oblivion. And men had done this: the mysterious D-squads who travelled through subspace, attacking, destabilising, destroying...

Now one man stood between them and the total planetary break-up: Dr Faustaff, brilliant, overweight, Buick-driving, Hawaiian-shirted, space-commuting, always-on-call, Earth repair man and physicist. Who was 'Frisco-bound with a hitch-hiking redhead when the first off-Earth Emergency call came in...