Reaching his majority, Clane turns his estate into a laboratory where he can test new inventions and machines that he has retrieved from the ruins of ancient cities and reactivated.

When the Venusians capture the Lord Advisor and thousands of his troops and prepare to hang them, Clane appears in their camp and displays the awesome power of the Atom Gods.

In 1956 Kirkus Reviews had this to say about the novel: The year is 12,000 A.D. with a culture which makes gods of Uranium, Plutonium, Radium and Ecks and has temple scientists to guard them.

He is responsible for Martian and Venusian victories, salvages the empire after a barbarian invasion and is ready to protect the system against a possible attack from outer space.

[4]Galaxy reviewer Floyd C. Gale faulted the novel for its odd internal contradictions, in particular a scene where "a fleet of spaceships makes a strafing run over the enemy, loosing flights of arrows from point-blank range.

"[5] Science Fiction author George Hay said that, while he did have criticism of Vogt's prose, Empire of the Atom was "well written by orthodox standards.