I've always been afraid to admit to reading Science Fiction or Fantasy. I didn't want to be THAT girl. I don't go to Comicon, I don't think I've ever watched any of the original Star Wars movies in one sitting. It just doesn't interest me. Before you start freaking out, please understand that people with different opinions are the spice of life.

So I was incredulous to hop on the Robert A. Heinlein bandwagon. But man am I glad I did. This was a delightful little book that was science fiction, but with a compelling story about Max escaping his step-fathers tyrannical thumb to become the astrogater he always thought he was meant to be. He overcomes obstacles, runs into even more obstacles, and succeeds. I was rooting for him the entire time.

I would totally recommend this to one of my teenagers, also.

Definitely one of my favourites of the Heinlein Juveniles, this book tells the story of Max Jones, a star struck farm boy with an eidetic memory, who leaves home and gets a berth on a starship. The story unfolds gradually, starting small and close to home and following Jones on his travels (both physical and professional) to a very different place.

This story is a prime example of what Heinlein is best at; imagining a world that is very different to ours and letting it unfold around the reader in a perfectly natural way. This is a world of starships and easy interstellar space travel, but also one with no computers as we would recognise them - all space navigation must be painstakingly calculated by hand using printed conversion tables (an important plot point). It is also a world where almost all professions are rigidly controlled by hereditary guilds, an obstacle which Jones must overcome if he is to fulfill his ambition of becoming a spaceman. All of which the reader takes as a matter of course, so smoothly is the story written.

My son and I are having a good time working our way through Heinlein's juveniles as we find them on used book sites.

Listened to this old Heinlein YA book. It was fairly entertaining. On the plus side, I have always enjoyed his characters, often expressing a certain can do spirit from the 1940s and 50s. This is true often of characters who are down on their luck or scaliwags such as the amusing Sam that our protagonist meets originally in a hobo compound. On the negative side, the technology is very dated. The whole concept of an astrogator who performs star spanning calculations by hand or in their heads using look up tables in books is almost alien to the present. Also, Heinlein's approach to women often rankles.
So, a fun read if you are willing to cut some slack for the aged science and some opinions but fun for the positive attitude about progress and the characters.

RESEÑA PENDIENTE

I think I'm officially a Heinlein fan. Husband has read them all. All. I'm catching up. What is appealing to me is not the science but the social commentary. In this book, it's about the jobs that one can have. Desirable jobs are hereditary, or you have to know someone or have money. It's a rotten system, and I see echoes in our own society. But the story is also just a good yarn. Farmer boy dreams of becoming a space engineer, gets stymied by the system, overcomes obstacles, and has some dramatic adventures. It's outdated in some ways and certainly not in others. It's a juvenile book, but it's not really.

I mentioned to a friend that "I picked up a Heinlein I haven't read at a charity shop" (Myrorna) but then added "well, it being a Heinlein I kind of have".

This is an early Heinlein before he let his pen run away with him. Probably it fits into his Future History series somewhere - pretty far down the line. Some of his technology is laughable - the Tomahawk and the Javelin, for example which are some sort of magnorocket aircraft shot between rings at low altitude and supersonic speed carrying freight and passengers around the world. There are other things as for example programming languages. Computer computations have to be "translated" into binary. Photographic plates are still necessary when plotting stellar positions and wormholes are accessible by flying just under the speed of light and then "tipping over" just as the ship reaches the anomaly. There are no cell phones either which is somewhat surprising though important in one of the subplots. Socially men still run things; the guilds, businesses, space ships. I don't think there was even a woman in the serving staff.

But Mr Heinlein can tell a good story – even if you recognize most of the elements and figure out pretty early on how it will go.  We have young farm boy Max Jones who finagles his way onto a starship as a "stableman" taking care of animals and emptying cat boxes but ends up as captain. This reminds me of Mr Heinlein's tour de force in this genre: Citizen of the Galaxy where the protagonist begins by being sold as slave to a beggar and ends up a ruler of the galaxy!

Some of the technology is pretty cool. Max hitches a ride on a long haul truck: "...The Molly Malone was two hundred feet long and stream lined such that she had negative lift when cruising. This came to Max's attention from watching the instruments; when she first quivered and raised, the dial marked ROAD CLEARANCE showed nine inches, but as they gathered speed down the acceleration strip it decreased to six..."
Some of the technology is less impressive: "...Max got out his uncle's slide rule. 'If she just supports her own weight at nine inches clearance, then at three inches the repulsion would be twenty-seven times her weight... but what makes her go?'
'It's a phase relationship. The field crawls forward and Molly tries to catch up – only she can't. Don't ask me the theory, I just push the buttons.' Red struck a cigarette and lounged back, one hand on the tiller..." (pp.28-29)

Max has sound judgement and priorities: "The library book had been burning a hole in his rucksack; at Oklahoma City he noticed a postal box at the freight drop and, on impulse, dropped the book into it....the book had to be returned. Vagrancy in the eyes of the law had not worried him, nor trespass, nor impersonating a licensed teamster – but filching a book was a sin." (p.30)

Things move along pretty linearly for quite a space but then Mr Heinlein tosses us out on a tangent and jerks us around for most of the rest of the book.

A good part of the story is taken up with the "Worry Hole" the command centre where the astrogator, and assistants, the computerman and assistants and a chartsman or two and a communicator all sweat and calculate especially before a "jump". What goes on here is too complicated to understand and this part drags considerably even though clashing personalities pep things up a bit. And none of these people, with one or two exceptions, are anything but interchangeable voices.

Our protagonist Mr Jones and his cohort/mentor/shipmate/friend Sam are the main characters and surprisingly also a girl, a passenger on the Asgard, Ellie and her alien pet Mr Chips. "The only extra-terrestrial among Max,s charges was a spider puppy from the terrestrian planet Hespera. .. Max looked into a sad, little, rather simian face... 'Hello, Man.' ...The creature's fur was a deep, rich green on its back, giving way to orange on the sides and blending to warm cream color on its little round belly." (p. 58)

Sam is perhaps the only character given a personal voice and this is achieved by his maladroit use of metaphor:
"...Grab your bonnet. We'll strike while the iron's in the fire and let the bridges fall where they may..." (p.46)
"... I have other reasons we needn't go into to want to let sleeping dogs bury their own dead..." (p.53)
"...Be seeing you, kid – and remember; it's an ill wind that has no turning..." (p. 56)
"...Max, I like you. But you haven't learned yet that when in Rome, you shoot Roman candles..." (p.57)
"...As grandpop used to say, 'It's an ill wind that gathers no moss'..." (p.69)
"...Anyhow as Sam would say, no use cryin' over spilt milk when the horse was already stolen..." (p. 163)
Fans of Firefly will appreciate that first quotation. I wonder if Mr Whedon read this...

All in all a pretty typical early Heinlein - from 1953. It is entertaining and even a bit thought provoking. Some aliens are not cute and their relationships with other species and with other aliens is interesting to consider. Though mostly this is just for fun.

This is one of the early Robert Heinlein novels. In my opinion, not shared by Wikipedia, the early novels end with Have Space Suit - Will Travel written in 1958. Is it a coincidence that this is just after the first Sputnik launch in 1957? I suspect not.

This book is from 1953 and fits in well with Heinlein’s other early novels where the hero is a young man who through luck or ability or a bit of both gets into space. In many respects these early books are optimistic views of how the future could go. It’s interesting that Heinlein isn’t young when he wrote his early novels, he was born in 1907 so he was 46 when he wrote Starman Jones.

An interesting book that admittedly has dated and feels like a book from the 1950s.

Second read – 1 December 1980. Re-read this Heinlein Juvenile at the recommendation of a co-worker.

First read – 1 January 1968. Ordered from Scholastic Book Services in my 8th grade school class.

Missed this one as a kid; read it in 2006 but no review; decided to rectify that. Right in the middle of the Heinlein juveniles, this book shows what one kid can overcome with a little help from his friends. The only thing better would have been to close with stepdad as the cab driver or similar.

Other reviewers note that computers have replaced the books and tables of math calculations. Well, except for Dune of course ;) This was a minor point (at least until it was a major point), and the story still worked fine for me. Mr. Chips was a fun side character.

Apparently RAH authorized this for adaptation as a play in the early 70s. I can see the structure, though a modern performance would need some updating for the computer problem.

There are only 3 juveniles I haven't read - the first, fifth and eleventh. Also recently finished reread of Starship Troopers, which is 13 on some lists (and not a juvenile at all on others).

Had this one for so many years. I always wanted to get thru Heinlein's juveniles, and am slowly getting there.
This one holds up to time as a rollicking space adventure for our main character, a poor farm boy, Max Jones, who joins on to a spaceship, run by the form of Navy, first under an assumed name, then through all mishaps and misadventures, becomes a legitimate member of the ship.
It was a quick and enjoyable read.

Almost a coming of age, growing up story arc of a lad that was barefoot poor on a 1950s era farmstead that grew into a captain lost in space, who saves the day. A simple book, but some good hard sci-fi elements included. I always like Heinlein's way of writing that makes things feel like real life. Some of the characters were kind of stereotypical, and it included some dated sexism from characters that shows this book is from 1951. But it was still quite enjoyable.