Olin Howland

A small town is menaced by a blood-red mass of protoplasm from outer space that is set on consuming all of the local residents.

"Man has split the atom and created the ultimate weapon. But how could he have known he would also create Them? ... Them! begins in New Mexico with a child wandering in shock, a ransacked general store -- and a battered corpse full of enough formic acid to kill 20 men. It ends with an epic struggle in the 700 miles of storm drains under Los Angeles, where the insect hordes are beaten. But they're not conquered, because they spawned a generation of...