John Brunner. Very much not one of his finest. An "Ace" double-paperback with the equally cruddy "The Martian Missile". The intrinsic idea - monster disturbed by deep-sea expedition with mental powers seeks to dominate humanity but is foiled - is so-so but hardly novel; shades of Cthullu or Godzilla or such; but the prose is dreadful as are the wooden characters.The initial catastrophe that overtakes the master race is somewhat sketchily described, but I blame them for failing to foresee it; and it seems implausible that they didn't. Or put another way, the very crude and very simple master-slave society sketched out isn't really plausible. Notice, by the way, that in the intro His Impreial Evilness speaks to his people to make them do stuff; by later in the book we have the rather less plausible scheme by which he causes pain which only stops when you do what he wants.
HIE's treatment of his slaves in our time doesn't seem very plausible either, as they are too likely to die, to his own inconcenience.
The most that can be said for this is that it passed a few hours in Blackwell's who have foolishly moved their scifi section to another building.
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