The author is H.G. Wells. It has been made into several movies. There is even a British one, with weird lighting. The story is that while Mars was at its closest to Earth, creatures looked at us with envious eyes, and "slowly, and surely drew their plans against us."
I found the Spielberg version the most frightening, because the Martians knew CENTURIES ago that they were going to take over Earth, so they had BURIED THEIR WAR MACHINES beneath Earth's surface, then brought them out when it was time to invade.
From the moment the invaders arrived, breathed our air, ate and drank, they were doomed. They were undone, destroyed, after all of man's weapons and devices had failed, by the tiniest creatures that God, in His wisdom, had put upon this Earth.
By the toll of a billion deaths, man had earned his immunity, his right to survive among this planet's infinite organisms, and that right is ours against all challenges, for neither do men live or die in vain.
~ H. G. Wells
From the 1953 version of WAR OF THE WORLDS
