Stephen Marlowe 20 min read

Burt is sick of hauling the family out to the asteroids for a picnic every weekend, but with a wife and two spoiled brats goading him, what can a man do? Only this weekend isn't quite routine.

Stephen Marlowe's 1953 story mines wry first-contact space opera from a very ordinary family outing gone wrong. Fun, sharp golden-age SF. Read it for a genial story where a put-upon father's dull weekend picnic among the asteroids takes a decidedly unexpected turn.

In its time

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

Reading it

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

Illustrated by

Joseph Eberle