Shuddering castle

A wealthy, reclusive New York family is shaken when an elder brother's late-life obsession with astronomy and short-wave radio leads to confirmed interplanetary signals and eventual contact with Mars. The narrative follows strange broadcasts, a plausible humanoid visitor from the Martian jungles who appears at an eccentric scientist's Long Island castle, and a sequence of mysterious events that disturb the household. Alongside technological speculation are human tensions: a budding romance between a young newspaperman and the family's charming niece, personal secrets, fear, and sudden deaths that turn scientific wonder into suspense.