Up the Walls of the World

Plot

Alice Bradley Sheldon (born Alice Hastings Bradley; August 24, 1915 – May 19, 1987) was an American science fiction author better known as James Tiptree Jr., a pen name she used from 1967 to her death. It was not publicly known until 1977 that James Tiptree Jr. was a woman. From 1974 to 1985 she also used the pen name Raccoona Sheldon. Sheldon was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2012. The James Tiptree Jr. Award, honoring works of science fiction or fantasy that expand or explore our understanding of gender, was named in her honor.

A constant theme in Sheldon's work is feminism.

The novel explores the possibility that telepathy and other psychic phenomena are real. It describes an attempt to invade Earth by beings with advanced telepathic abilities from the planet Tyree.

The book considers the subject of sentience in different life forms inhabiting widely different environments; in computers; and in a vast sentient inhabitant of deep space formed of a network of widely spaced nodes.