Evelyn E. Smith 43 min read

Newlyweds James and Phyllis settle onto a lovely, fairy-tale version of Earth, blue grass, golden trees, sweet air, never guessing this seeming paradise has designs on their marriage.

Evelyn E. Smith's 1956 story is a wry first-contact and social-SF tale. Clever, funny golden-age SF. Read it for a genial story that drops the Eternal Triangle onto an alien world, where a too-perfect planet complicates a young couple's happiness, in a witty golden-age comedy with a sly speculative twist.

In its time

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

Reading it

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

Illustrated by

Dick Francis