R. R. Winterbotham 17 min read

Eight miles up in his triumphant new stratosphere plane, inventor Dr. Duerkes and his condescending pilot encounter living clouds, and learn, quite literally, what it means to eat their words.

R. R. Winterbotham's 1941 story is a wry first-contact and hard-SF tale. Clever, fun golden-age SF. Read it for a genial stratospheric adventure where airmen meet strange living entities of the upper air, in a light, inventive golden-age piece that mixes real speculation about the high atmosphere with a good-humored comeuppance.

In its time

Published in 1941, during the 1940s, the golden age begins.

Reading it

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

Illustrated by

Boris Dolgov