abstract:Direct Descent (1980) is a short science fiction novel by Frank Herbert. It was based on the short story "Pack Rat Planet" published in 1954 in Astounding Science-Fiction.
But surely there is a direct line of descent from James Thurber (1894-1961), many of whose madcap sketches and parables draw on his childhood in Columbus, Ohio and the inherently uneasy relationship between men and women and the comparative sublimity of dogs (even those that bite).