2001: A Space Odyssey

In 1968 Arthur C. Clarke published 2001: A Space Odyssey. He worked on the book with Stanley Kubrick during the making of the movie by the same name. The book and movie are based on the series of short stories published by Clarke including The Sentinel written in 1948 for a competition by the BBC.

The book covers mankind’s development while an unseen alien race spurs their evolution. A black monolith lands on Earth on the equator in ancient Africa in three million B. C. There it influences the man-apes to develop the use of tools and leads them to learn to kill for food to survive and thrive.