Heinlein, Robert

• The Past Through Tomorrow (8 r)

  • Perhaps the best short-story collection I have ever read. This one starts out with the unforgettable "Lifeline" about a man who finds he can predict a person's moment of death. It goes on with some very powerful stories, all somewhat linked together, in a cohesive future history.

• Stranger in a Strange Land (6 r)

  • This novel chronicles the experiences of a very humanlike Martian who visits Earth and adds new words, like "grok", to the dictionary. Anyway, it serves as a good mechanism to examine society of the time, and it is very readable. I'm not sure I'd rate it as a classic, but I can see how it must have touched a nerve when it was written. Probably has a lot of parallels with the experiences of people who have once lived in a non-violent religious compound, like with the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. Not in a bad way, but in a weird way.

• The Cat Who Walks Through Walls (3 r)

  • Forgettable story about a spy/hero type set in Heinlein's future world. I was disappointed and don't recommend this one.

• Friday (3 r)

  • Story about a female sentient robot agent in Heinlein's future. A little better than "The Cat..." but not too much.

• Job: A Comedy of Justice (5 r)

  • Interesting story about an evangelist on the business end of the dispenser of life's problems. Not bad, and the philosophical/religious ground it covers is fairly interesting. For some reason, it reminded me of Adams' Dirk Gently...or perhaps that should be the other way 'round. I sometimes get the two books confused in my mind.

• Starship Troopers (6 r)

  • Very good story about soldiers trying to fight off ant-like aliens on another world. Won a deserved Hugo back in the late 50's. Precursor to Steakley's excellent "Armor".

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