This short novel / long novella (it doesn't quite reach 200 pages with big type and a relatively small page) has promise, but doesn't quite work. The frame is that someone has learned of a government organization that investigates and covers up evidence of aliens, and we're reading their research... except for the parts that are from the perspective of the aliens and couldn't possibly be recorded by anyone. By including chapters from the 3rd person present POV of the aliens, they end up not being very alien, and because their characters are rather flat (this is not Budrys's strength), these sections don't add much. I think he needed to present the entire work as a collection of the researcher's notes and acquired evidence of the existence of aliens; those chapters, like "Transcribed Conversation; Albert Camus; William Henshaw:" work well and kept me reading.
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