This destruction begins with an eclipse, “The eclipse that results, with the moon seven times the apparent diameter of Beta, covers all of Lagash and lasts well over half a day, so that no spot on the planet escapes the effects” Lagash will find itself in centre of a giant cluster of thirty thousand mighty stars despite which there will be complete darkness. The scientific explanation – Aton and the group of scientists in the Observatory have, after painstaking research found that nine previous civilizations of Lagash were destroyed by fire at the height of their culture and no one could tell why. There is a scientific explanation, and also a mythological explanation from the Cultists’ Book of Revelation offered in the narrative for this madness. This event will occur not because of any catastrophic event, but because the people will go mad and self- destruct themselves. Five suns have already set and the sixth Beta is about to set in four hours. The world as Lagash knows will come to an end in four hours.

Lagash is a distant civilisation which has six suns across its sky which constantly spreads light to the planet. The time frame of the story is four hours and has a single setting, which is the Observatory at Saro University. The story inter-twines scientific facts with myth and fantasy and presents the terrifying prospect of the world coming to an end because of darkness. The story begins a few hours before pitch darkness engulfs the entire planet. ‘Nightfall’ tells the story of planet Lagash which remains in perpetual sunlight and is about to experience its first night in 2,049 years.

Nightfall book asimov