Human diplomat Fanielle Anjou and her Thranx counterpart work to overcome the mutual suspicions between the two races in order to achieve a Thranx/human alliance, but xenophobes on both sides try to ensure that an alliance never occurs.

Bestselling author Alan Dean Foster takes us back to the unplanned beginnings of the extraordinary Humanx Commonwealth…
In the years after first contact, humans and the intelligent insectlike Thranx agree to a tentative sharing of ideas and cultures despite the ingrained repulsion they have yet to overcome. Thus, a slow, lengthy process of limited contact begins.
Yet they never plan for a chance meeting between a misfit artist...