Poul Anderson Karen Anderson 33 min read

A hayseed Martian among big-planet slickers is bound to get into trouble, but that's nothing compared to the trouble he'd be in if he didn't.

Poul and Karen Anderson's 1958 story mines warm comedy from a naive Martian visitor and the sharpers who underestimate him. Funny, charming social SF. Read it for a delightful fish-out-of-water caper where the country cousin from Mars turns out to be nobody's fool.

In its time

Published in 1958, during the 1950s, post-war optimism meets cold war anxiety.

Reading it

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

Illustrated by

Wallace Wood