Skip to main content

story identification - Looking for book: contact with aliens, five different races, mismatched claws, biological imperative to breed


I read this book when I was a teenager, or in my early twenties, so that puts it no later than 1979. My favorite authors at the time were (of course) Asimov, Bradbury, Clarke, Heinlein, and a few others. I've looked up the bibliographies of most of these, to no avail.


The story in general: Earth people spot a small alien craft near the sun. Investigating, they find a lone passenger, a female pilot from an alien race, whose distinguishing characteristic is that her hands are claws of two different sizes: one large, one small. She is suspiciously quiet about how she got there (I think). Examining the video footage, they find that, as the Earth ship approached, she jettisoned four other passengers into the sun.


There is much talk about sexual practices (which makes me think Heinlein). Earth society is going through another "sex is sinful" stage, but the alien female has a biological imperative to breed; if she doesn't have sex, she'll die. Since her shipmates are gone, she keeps getting sicker.


They return her to her own world, and find that there are five different races, all of which build a fully-integrated society. The creatures are of different size, shapes and colors, but all have the same mismatched claws. One breed of alien is like a technician, and, for example, while waiting outside by the car (which are a story in themselves), he or she uses the larger claw as a tool to repair, upgrade, or modify the vehicle. All of the aliens are capable of things like this, so there are no businesses to take care of it. Basically, everyone does everything, if I recall correctly.


I don't remember the resolution of the story, and probably for that reason it's been bothering me for several months. If this sounds familiar to anyone, please let me know the title and author, and if I can download a digital copy somewhere.



Answer



This is The Mote in God's Eye by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. Virtually everything you describe matches fully.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

futurama - How much time is lost in 'Time Keeps on Slippin''

In time Keeps on Slippin' , Farnsworth creates a basketball team which he matures by abusing Chronitons. This leads to time skipping forward by random, but ever increasing amounts. How much time was skipped in this way? Answer Unfortunately, I don't think a good estimate can be made for this, for two reasons: Many of the time skips move forward by an indeterminate amount of time. At one point, the Professor mentions localized regions of space skipping forward much more than others. We then see two young boys on the street below complaining about having to pay social security, only to suddenly become senior citizens and start complaining about wanting their money. Thus, each individual could have experienced a different amount of time skippage.
Post a Comment
Read more

aliens - Interstellar Zoo story

I vaguely remember this story from my childhood: it was about an interstellar zoo that came to Earth with lots of bizarre and unusual species, and humans would file through and gape at all the crazy looking creatures from other planets. The twist came at the end when the perspective shifted to the other side of the bars and we discovered that the "creatures" were traveling through space on a kind of safari. They thought they were the visitors and we were the animals. Neither side knew that the other side thought they were the zoo creatures. Answer Got it. Zoo, by Edward D. Hoch. Published in 1958. Link to Publication History Link to PDF
Post a Comment
Read more

harry potter - What is the difference between Diffindo and Sectumsempra?

In the Harry Potter books, Diffindo is called the 'Severing Charm' and it’s most commonly used to cut ropes and the like. However, in the last book Hermione uses it on Ron but misses, creating a 'slash in his jeans' and his knee gets cut, causing him to 'roar in pain'. We've only seen Sectumsempra used once on screen when Harry directly uses it on Malfoy in the sixth book, but there it's mentioned that he is 'waving his wand wildly'. Wouldn't Diffindo, if used in such a fashion also cause a similar effect? Similarly, if it was able to cut Ron, it would also be able to, say, chop off an ear (George's)? In that case, how are these two spells different, except for Sectumsempra seemingly used exclusively to hurt humans? Answer While Diffindo and Sectumsempra both can be countered by other spells, Diffindo is far more easily countered. Reparo, a relatively common spell, can completely reverse its effect when used once. “He pulled the old cop...
Post a Comment
Read more

harry potter - How could Expelliarmus beat Avada Kedavra?

I want to be very careful about how I ask this question – I am not asking How did Voldemort die? [CLOSED] Below the text is the relevant passages from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows if anyone wants to review them (I'm sorry for the amount of text). How did Expelliarmus beat Avada Kedavra and kill Voldemort? I feel the reason Harry's Expelliarmus overpowered Voldemort's Avada Kedavra curse has to do with who was master of the Elder Wand and how the Elder Wand works. I've always had trouble understanding fully how the Elder Wand works, though. How much did the fact that Voldemort never truly won or mastered the Elder Wand factor into how Expelliarmus reacted to Avada Kedavra and caused Avada Kedavra to rebound and kill Voldemort? An answer based in book canon would be especially welcome, but any canon source really is fine. Harry heard the high voice shriek as he, too, yelled his best hope to the heavens, pointing Draco’s wand: ‘ Avada Kedavra !’ ‘ Expelliarmus !...
Post a Comment
Read more