Curtis, Betsy – “A Peculiar People” (1951)

A robot attache from Mars finds love on Earth, while keeping his robo-identity a secret. As the human ambassador reminds him: “Check appearance carefully with a mirror. Martian security demands Terran ignorance of your mechanical nature!” This demand is because “It’s only human nature, you know, to be afraid of machines, and what men fear they fight.”

The recipient of his affections turns out to have a secret of her own. You’ll never guess what it is.

A rather blatant example of the normalization of science-fictionalisms so prevalent this year – robots are just well-engineered people.