Judith Merril 56 min read

Who was this strange girl, born in this place, and yet for whom it still wasn't home? They even had to make her a license plate, and clothes just like the ones on television.

Judith Merril's 1956 story follows a girl who is not quite what she seems, navigating a human world she was made to pass in. Sharp, humane first-contact social SF from a major voice. Read it for a subtle, affecting tale of belonging and difference, seen through an outsider's careful eyes.

In its time

Published in 1956, during the 1950s, post-war optimism meets cold war anxiety.

Reading it

56 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).