Best Robert Heinlein novel?

My favorite is TMIAHM, mostly because it introduces Hazel Stone as a child, but partly because I did the frontispiece image of Heinlein Crater as a birthday present for Ginny.

However, The Rolling Stones is my fondest read.
 
psikeyhackr said:
Wow! A 10 year old thread. This thread is older than I was when I started reading science fiction.

I think that is a major point of SF. The Golden age of science fiction is 12.

I searched this thread for "idea", "orphan" and "age"

I think SF can be very important in relation to the AGE at which a book introduces a child to ideas.

Orphans of the Sky may not have been the first Heinlein book I read but if it wasn't then I don't know what it was. That book introduced me to the idea that a society has a paradigm of reality and it might be completely wrong. The obvious comparison to the real world is Galileo's conflict with the Catholic church.

It was my first introduction to the concept of mutants, generation ships and artificial gravity by rotation. So SF is useful for the introduction of ideas. I am not sure grade school kids care that much about the quality of the writing but the quality of the story FROM THEIR PERSPECTIVE could matter a lot. The story might not interest people over 30 very much.

Next for ideas is Citizen of the Galaxy. This introduces ideas about child rearing and education and touches on reality with Samuel Renshaw. He was a real psychologist whose developments were used to train soldiers in World War II but now we never hear about him.

The Moon is a Harsh Mistress mentions Loglan which if researched leads to Alfred Korzybski whose ideas interested Heinlein as far back as the 1940s.

Good science fiction is not just fiction. Modern stuff has become shallow junk.

What is there really of any depth to Hyperion?

This is from Torch of Freedom by David Weber:
The right sci-fi books provide an expanded view of the universe of ideas not just stories.

Heinlein did that better than most.

psik
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Oh no, a 19 year old thread.

I still pick Citizen of the Galaxy. I actually do not understand why so many people like Have Spacesuit Will Travel so much. It was just kind of fun, never actually interesting.
 
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psikeyhackr said:
Oh no, a 19 year old thread.

I still pick Citizen of the Galaxy. I actually do not understand why so many people like Have Spacesuit Will Travel so much. It was just kind of fun, never actually interesting.
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And like fine wine, this thread has aged well. :D
 
Indeed it has. The Rolling Stones was the first Heinlein novel I read, about seventy years ago.

Loved it then, love it now.
 
I'm going personal and saying "Tunnel in the Sky" because it was the first one I read. I think I was 8 years old at the time and my grandmother had just let me loose on Aberystwyth library with a junior members ticket. :)
I got it out along with Fred Hoyles "Ossian's Ride."
They were both 'torch under the bedclothes' books.
Nowadays I am in my 70s, so allowed to keep the light on. Ironic that, now, I usually nod off over the book after 20 pages.
 
Astro Pen said:
I'm going personal and saying "Tunnel in the Sky" because it was the first one I read. I think I was 8 years old at the time and my grandmother had just let me loose on Aberystwyth library with a junior members ticket. :)
I got it out along with Fred Hoyles "Ossian's Ride."
They were both 'torch under the bedclothes' books.
Nowadays I am in my 70s, so allowed to keep the light on. Ironic that, now, I usually nod off over the book after 20 pages.
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I always thought Tunnel in the Sky would make a great film.:cool:


There is exists an animated miniseries adaptation of Robert Heinlein's novel Red Planet. it was made in 1994.
 
Funny thing about Tunnel in the Sky:

Screenshot_20230811-024211.jpg

Screenshot_20230811-024131.jpg


Supposedly there are clues in the story that the main character was of African descent. I never caught them.
 
We didn't talk much about Robert's books, but in conversation, Ginny has mentioned Rod Walker being black.
 
Astro Pen said:
I'm going personal and saying "Tunnel in the Sky" because it was the first one I read. I think I was 8 years old at the time and my grandmother had just let me loose on Aberystwyth library with a junior members ticket. :)
I got it out along with Fred Hoyles "Ossian's Ride."
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Re "the first one," and not just my first Heinlein, but the first sf book I ever bought: DOUBLE STAR. (I still have that copy, too.) I hold that book responsible for addicting me to science fiction. (And, in a strange coincidence, I bought OSSIAN'S RIDE later that same year...)(It didn't hook me so much...)
 
I only read a few of his novels (plus many short stories, like the Future History collection), and really liked Stranger in a Strange Land as well as Starship Troopers. I got about half way through I Will Fear No Evil and never picked up a novel of his again.
 
AllanR said:
I only read a few of his novels (plus many short stories, like the Future History collection), and really liked Stranger in a Strange Land as well as Starship Troopers. I got about half way through I Will Fear No Evil and never picked up a novel of his again.
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One Ive been tempted to read is The Number of the Beast.
 
I actually think that Robert Heinlein's best books were his "Juveniles" and that they read best if you read them when you are between 9-14. Some of them made a lasting impression on me. One that I still think about often is Have Spacesuit Will Travel. I'm not sure about the dates he used for this, but the space technology humanity has in that book is only slightly ahead of what we have today.
 
I enjoyed Stranger in a Strange Land when I read it years ago, but I really enjoyed the Lazarus Long books. I believe The Cat Who Walks Through Walls is one and I loved it. It was a looong time ago though.
 
BAYLOR said:
They recently publish an alternate version of that one .:unsure:
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Yes they did, The Pursuit of the Pankera. The first third or so of The Number of the Beast, then it veers away into something with a much more traditionally Heinleinesque storyline and ending. I enjoyed it, but there are mixed reviews on Goodreads.
 
Pyan said:
Yes they did, The Pursuit of the Pankera. The first third or so of The Number of the Beast, then it veers away into something with a much more traditionally Heinleinesque storyline and ending. I enjoyed it, but there are mixed reviews on Goodreads.
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Whoa! I read the synopsis of The Number of the Beast and it sounds like some kind of fever dream. Not interested in it at all. The Pursuit of the Pankera has a little more allure, but I wouldn't pay much for it.
 
I really enjoyed reading The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, it's a good blend of the fantastical and practical.
 
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