{"product_id":"2940150267336","title":"Worms And Other Alien Encounters","description":"Why would aliens visit earth? I asked myself that question early in my writing career and rejected the more benign responses like \"They want to be our friends!\" or \"They want to help us progress toward a new age of Enlightenment!\" because, well, an advanced alien species encountering us would hardly be impressed; quite the contrary. After all, they would be advanced, as in dramatically superior to us. I also didn't want to have them show up to blow us to bits (which they could easily do, being superior to us), since that's been a bit overdone since H.G. Wells' \"The War of the Worlds.\" So I thought about it, came up with a few plausible responses that fell between these two extremes and wrote some stories for the ones that seemed to make the most sense. This collection is mostly a product of exploring alien encounters of this sort, with a sprinkling of stories set in space thrown in for good measure.","brand":"Robert P. Hansen","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47068313616624,"sku":"2940150267336","price":2.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940150267336_p0.jpg?v=1763741519","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940150267336","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}