[1] In the book, humanity discovers Greenworld just as Earth finally collapses under the pressure of mankind's impact and a generation ship with ten thousand people is sent to colonize the planet.

[2][3] The book is divided into several shorter chapters, each telling a short story and featuring illustrations of the local animals and their interactions and relations to humans.

[3] By the end of the book, Greenworld and its ecosystems are in ruins, mankind having caused a mass extinction event through their actions on the planet.

[5] In this capacity, Greenworld first appeared in the Channel 4 programme E.T, Please call Earth (part of the series Equinox) in 1992, followed by appearances in BBC's It'll Never Work?, The Radio Times and in BBC Focus in 1993 and it was one of many hypothetical alien worlds by different scientists featured on the BBC2/Discovery Channel programme Natural History of an Alien in 1997.

[5][7] The majority of the illustrations in Greenworld were done by Dixon himself, though some images were also produced by other artists[5] such as Julius T. Csotonyi[8] and Margaret Walty.