Robert Abernathy 12 min read

'Junior!' bellows Pater; 'Junior!' echoes Mater, for their wayward offspring has strayed off again, and with the tide going out, the young idiot may be playing in the deadly shallows.

Robert Abernathy's 1956 story mines charming comedy from a very alien family and their errant child. Funny, clever first-contact social SF. Read it for a delightful tale of parental exasperation among nonhuman parents, and a young rebel who won't stay put.

In its time

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

Reading it

12 min read (a short story, a single idea, delivered and gone).

Illustrated by

Weiss