Oh, come on! Mildly interesting alien race, though their differences (physical and historical/cultural) don't seem to have made their lives much different from humans. But the humans' handling of them is really awkward. Is this, somehow, a one-culture world? Or have all these eminent First Contact experts put on total blinders? The one real question raised by the contact is not answered; instead, we get a blindingly anticlimatic realization from the protagonist. There might be some interesting stories in this world, but this isn't one of them. ( )

A good, short, First Contact story. ( )