Evelyn E. Smith 18 min read

Trading with the natives was like taking candy from a kid, but which were the natives? A young telepathic alien lies glibly to its mother while conspiring with a friend against the newcomers.

Evelyn E. Smith's 1953 story is a clever first-contact and colonization tale told from a wholly alien child's point of view. Sharp, witty golden-age SF. Read it for a story where the question of who is trading whom flips delightfully, seen through youthful nonhuman eyes.

In its time

Published in 1953, during the 1950s, post-war optimism meets cold war anxiety.

Reading it

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

Illustrated by

Dick Francis