Hugo & Nebula Awards: Best Novels discussion

Robert Anson Heinlein (1907 – 1988) was one of the most famous American science-fiction author of the 20th century, often called the "dean of science fiction". He was multiple time Hugo Award winner and his work continues to have an influence on the science-fiction genre. Hugo 2020 nominee The Light Brigade is a polemic to Hugo-winning Starship Troopers.

Four of his novels won Hugo Awards. In addition, fifty years after publication, seven of his works were awarded "Retro Hugos"—awards given retrospectively for works that were published before the Hugo Awards came into existence. He was named the first Science Fiction Writers Grand Master in 1974 and possibly the title was introduced to honor him and then become annual.

Heinlein was the third of seven children. He spent his childhood in Kansas City, Missouri. Heinlein graduated from Central High School in Kansas City in 1924 and , he graduated from the Naval Academy in 1929 with the equivalent of a Bachelor of Arts degree in Engineering. After a short stay in Navy he was discharged from the Navy due to pulmonary tuberculosis in 1934. During a lengthy hospitalization, and inspired by his own experience while bed-ridden, he developed a design for a waterbed.

His first short story Life Line was published in 1939. His 'war' period is mostly short stories and novellas. After the war he got a contract with the Charles Scribner's Sons publishing company that went from 1947 through 1959 and published juvenile novels, at the rate of one book each autumn, in time for Christmas presents to teenagers. The final installment ought to be Starship Troopers but the publisher assumed it too radical.

The 1960s was the Golden age for Heinlein, with his most famous works, including Starship Troopers, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Stranger in a Strange Land.

In the 1970s he has health problems (and that of his wife) and almost stopped writing. All his later works are much more rumbling and philosophizing.

In 2020 the previously unpublished novel The Pursuit of the Pankera: A Parallel Novel About Parallel Universes (1977) was published

Awesome, thanks Oleksandr. I had no idea about the 2020 title.

thanks for doin this Z

Asimov and Heinlein dominated my youth reading and caused my lifelong affinity to the genre.

TomK2 wrote: "Asimov and Heinlein dominated my youth reading and caused my lifelong affinity to the genre."

Echo this. I rate RAH as the best ever still, have all of paperbacks I collected over the years and periodically re-read. Asimov besides his own novels, gave me Hugo anthologies that opened all the rest of Sci/Fi and later fantasy. Early Stephen King is to blame for my foray into that other genre.

TomK2 wrote: "Asimov and Heinlein dominated my youth reading and caused my lifelong affinity to the genre."

Every once in a while, when I am really stressed, I will read one of Heinlein's juveniles. It was a happier time. I get really tired of all the doom and gloom books that are so popular now.

if this is the wrong thread let me know but just finished D.A. by Connie Willis a short novella which is a nod to Heinlein's juveniles and worth the time. The spaceship academy is called the RAH.

John wrote: "if this is the wrong thread let me know but just finished D.A. by Connie Willis a short novella which is a nod to Heinlein's juveniles and worth the time. The spaceship..."

Thanks for the info!

I, too, was totally marinated in Heinlein novels as kid, reading many of novels 10 times or more. Even now, decades later, I find him a compelling storyteller with a prodigious imagination. I will say that some of his peculiarities became more apparent to me as I got older: a survivalist libertarian (common phenotype in sci-fi) and perhaps a thread of trans tendencies. I continue to recommend his novels to anyone who seems receptive and I am happy for their influence on me.

I avoided Heinlein for many years because I had a mistaken assumption that his work would be too pulpy and boring. I was wrong. I really loved most of The Fantasies of Robert A. Heinlein, and will try to read more from him in the future.

I read several Heinlein novels in my teens but oddly I never read the juveniles. I’ve read a couple of them now and they come off pretty cheesy to me. But I’ll pick away at them when I can use something light.

Man, am I glad that the notifications are back. Following any thread on my phone without them was a hassle.

Just as Allan, I've only read the note serious works by Heinlein and I was actually surprised to learn that he's written so many of juveniles.

I just read The Dreams Our Stuff is Made Of: How Science Fiction Conquered the World by Thomas M. Disch. One of the most interesting things I learned was that Heinlein's politics were originally more left-leaning than I'd ever known. He ran for office in the "EPIC" party and may have started his writing career to pay of the campaign debts.

"EPIC" was trying to "End Poverty in California" though government programs, including government seizure of businesses. That was seen as socialist by many, though the actual Socialist party kicked out anyone who joined EPIC. Disch says that it was this stain of socialism that kept him from being able to work for the military in WWII.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/End_Pov...

Ed wrote: "Heinlein's politics were originally more left-leaning."

His biography The Pleasant Profession of Robert A. Heinlein talks about it too. In my view there is a problem that due to the voting system in the US only to big parties can exist and people think left-right as reps-dems. Heinlein was libertarian and there are libertarian with socialist steak if this is to local, not central government

The concepts of Left and Right definitely don't begin to cover all the possible political systems, and Libertarians are sometimes seen as one and sometimes the other.

But, still, the EPIC party seems way out of line with what Heinlein advocated later. The part about "self-sufficient, worker-run co-ops" fits in. But the part about "seizure of idle factories and farm land," and government hiring the unemployed, and creating an income tax where there hadn't been one before are not ideas I would expect Heinlein to ever endorse.

Ed wrote: "the part about "seizure of idle factories and farm land," and government hiring the unemployed, and creating an income tax where there hadn't been one before are not ideas I would expect Heinlein to ever endorse."

I agree. At the same time is even early stories he mocks the current copyright system and monopolies linked to it, so he so so holders as monopolists... even so, he definitely moved to the (US) right in the 50s, because he saw the USSR as the biggest threat

Interesting new post by Scalzi on Bluesky:

“I reread Heinlein frequently; all his work is aging (as is everyone's) but not all of it at the same rate. Asimov I rarely reread, I find his prose workman-like at best and tin-eared at worst. He's inarguably incredibly important to SF, and also today there are SO MANY better writers of prose.”

He was replying to a post that read:

“ Haven't been able to read Heinlein or Asimov for decades, and I grew up on Heinlein”

I reread much Heinlein recently - as well as Asimov, and I still love them. I am used to reading scientific literature, so Asimov's writing style feels natural :)

Turned into a long discussion with many participants about experiencing older “cultural output” (Scalzi’s phrase) I.e. movies, tv etc besides books

I’ve been working to finish all the Empire/Foundation books this year. It was a re-read of Edge to recall it from 1983, F and Earth, Prelude & the three Empire novels. The latter were primitive but much better in tone than Asimov’s later Foundation books. It rankles me when characters get unreasonably stubborn or unnecessarily angry, and there is a lot of that in his later books. I realize it’s there to produce tension but it’s become a cliche writing device & I think that’s where Asimov fell down. Of course he’s not the only author to do this by far. Forward the Foundation is next in my queue & while it finishes the journey, I’m apprehensive. I still have a bunch of Robot short stories too but those are older, shouldn’t be an issue.

Heinlein for me is different case. I haven’t read all the juveniles, but when I go that far back, I find their simplicity refreshing. His later stuff, post-Time Enough for Love, is pretty much unreadable though.

Allan wrote: "Heinlein for me is different case. I haven’t read all the juveniles, but when I go that far back, I find their simplicity refreshing. His later stuff, post-Time Enough for Love, is pretty much unreadable though."

Agree re "unreadable." But I do like Friday

And I like most of The Number of the Beast except for the really unexplainable of inclusion of some (view spoiler)[ incest, as with some of his other later books (hide spoiler)] and (view spoiler)[ a really strange ending. Though cool, it was not really a resolution of what went before (hide spoiler)].

And I didn't mind Time Enough for Love, which, although wacky in the true Heinlein fashion as all the later ones are, delighted me because it was more Lazarus Long, whom I loved.

I actually went ahead a few years ago and read the "unreadable" ones. For those of you who don't know what we are talking about, here's a list of the "unreadable" ones IMHO

Job: A Comedy of Justice (1984) (which I do not remember at all and should reread before I condemn it)
The Cat Who Walks Through Walls(1985)
To Sail Beyond the Sunset (1987)

And no, the inclusion of Lazarus Long in the last two of these was not enough to save them for me

I also did not like these:
For Us, the Living: A Comedy of Customs (2003) (more a philosophical discussion than a novel)
The Pursuit of the Pankera: A Parallel Novel About Parallel Universes (2020) Truly disappointed after all the hype-and not even good enough to be hyped
Variable Star (2006) (with Spider Robinson) All I remember is I was disappointed. I thought with Spider Robinson at the helm that it would be much better than it was. Though I must say, all detail of it has blissfully disappeared into the mists of time.

My feeling is he just got too big for his britches and wouldn't let anyone edit him. Too bad.

I do find it interesting that someone has decided to group these books:

World As Myth
1. Time Enough for Love (1973)
2. The Number of the Beast (1980)
3. The Cat Who Walks Through Walls (1985)
4. To Sail Beyond the Sunset (1987)

It's a real thing. I searched on the internet and even the AIs think it. To me, these are just the ultimate conclusion of Heinlein's "Future History." But at least it separates out the "unreadable" ones per Allan's definition rather neatly.

Sorry, I got interested in the subject. Hope I didn't bore you

I've only read two Heinleins and they are both 1 star for me. One of them was "Stranger", the other "Friday." After these two, I can't imagine I will find a Heinlein book I genuinely enjoy, although I haven't tried the juveniles. There are still like 8 books of his on the H/N list that I have yet to get to, including some of the "unreadable" mentioned above.

Kateblue wrote: "
I actually went ahead a few years ago and read the "unreadable" ones. For those of you who don't know what we are talking about, here's a list of the "unreadable" ones IMHO

Job: A Comedy of Justice (1984) (which I do not remember at all and should reread before I condemn it)
The Cat Who Walks Through Walls(1985)
To Sail Beyond the Sunset (1987)"

I visit used bookstores a lot. I see these three, as well as "Grumbles from the Grave", ALL THE TIME. Clearly not a lot of people want them in their libraries and offload them to used stores. I never, ever see other Heinlein titles in used stores.
(Talking first editions only, I don't pay attention to other editions)

Kalin wrote: "I've only read two Heinleins and they are both 1 star for me. One of them was "Stranger", the other "Friday." After these two, I can't imagine I will find a Heinlein book I genuinely enjoy, althoug..."

The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress is one of my fave's. Ditto Starship Troopers, though it has a lot of philosophizing


I agree that Stranger is pretty dated and reads kinda stupid to me as an adult. I remember a discussion with a guy I used to work with. He had recently read it (late 1990s?) and said that Stranger was pure exploitation of the hippie stuff, and I said, "Hey first published in 1961, may have started hippie stuff." He rethought his opinion then.

And Heinlein does not do women characters well. Consensus of people I know IRL

All the juveniles are good, tho some are better than others, I wrote about that somewhere within this group. I wouldn't mind reading all of those again sometime. Takers?

I have a feeling I’ve written about my attitude to Heinlein in here before, but I’ll summarize.

I read most of his work as a kid and thought it was brilliant, up to about 1970. I Will Fear No Evil was literally unreadable for 14-year-old me. (I did get through it years later.) Time Enough for Love, when I read it, was a mix of the barely readable and the quite good. All of the books after that were again unreadable for me. I’ve tried some of them more than once. In the 70s I went back and read virtually everything he’d published. As a kid I took some of his political and social thought pretty seriously. At some point I rejected it altogether. There was a period of 20 or 30 years when I wouldn’t touch his stuff. More recently I’ve reread most of the pre-“Starship Troopers” juveniles and the “future history” stories, as well as some of the 1950s work, and enjoyed it to various degrees.

I want to reread more of the pre-Starship Troopers/1960 work but I’m pretty sure I’ll never re-read any of the later stuff. To me that’s the dividing line.

I read a ton of Heinlein in high school & college. First it was The Puppet Masters, then The Door Into Summer & Starship Troopers (the creepiness of Door didn't strike me till later). Then I was assigned Stranger in a Strange Land in my freshman Humanities class, a trendy college choice in 1975. I found The Past Through Tomorrow, which ends with Methuselah's Children, leading me into Time Enough for Love. The Past Through Tomorrow is a great collection of his most important short works, if you haven't read much of them. But that route is how I missed such classics as the Juveniles, The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress and Double Star. I enjoyed rereading Stranger with the group, probably more than I did when I was 18. I read Friday & a couple others, but I think I was saturated and moving on to other stuff. I've read all 11 on the H/N list and the only ones I want to read now are the Juveniles. I would take that up as a supplementary challenge; they're short and easy to knock out quickly.

Allan wrote: "I read a ton of Heinlein in high school & college. First it was The Puppet Masters, then The Door Into Summer & Starship Troopers (the creepiness of Door didn't strike me ..."

For me the juveniles are classics. I expect to reread The Star Beast this week; after that my current reread will be done except for Citizen of the Galaxy, one of the best. Maybe you have to be of a certain age to appreciate them that much.

Allan wrote: "I would take that up as a supplementary challenge; they're short and easy to knock out quickly. "

Let me know when, and if I can, I will join you. I think maybe chronologically by publication date?

That's fine. I think I'll try to squeeze one or two in this year, maybe one in each of November & December. Rocket Ship Galileo & Space Cadet, respectively. That shouldn't be too big a burden.

Allan wrote: "That's fine. I think I'll try to squeeze one or two in this year, maybe one in each of November & December. Rocket Ship Galileo & Space Cadet, respectively. That shouldn't..."

OK, I can probably do. Stephen, sorry I missed you!

Is a BR entry ok with everyone? Otherwise I forget

No problem. I will probably read at least Rocket Ship Galileo. It is somewhat different from the others and i couldn’t find a cheap physical copy so I haven’t read it recently.

Kateblue wrote: "Allan wrote: "Heinlein for me is different case. I haven’t read all the juveniles, but when I go that far back, I find their simplicity refreshing. His later stuff, post-Time Enough for Love, is pr..."

You... didn't actually like the Stranger in a Strange land????? To the point of giving it one star... ? I don't grok.....I mean... I generally find that whole hippie stuff silly and on occasion obnoxious, but it is still a powerful book, and it carries such feelings with it... I think the general thought exercise of what if the real God came to us (sent his son, whatever) right now - how would we collectively reject and abuse him - remains relevant and for all the bellyaching we lost the capacity to really love other humans even more than what they had in the 60s, not like I was there but anyway.
But I also really like a libertarian author, for a change. The Soviet Union upbringing gave me a bit of an allergy on its philosophies.

As long-term members of this group know, I'm a RAH's fan, I enjoyed his novels as a teen (they were just translated back then) and I loved his old grumpy men, who pontificate from every soapbox, I loved his approach of doing your utmost. As a teen who was too introverted and with the absence of the Internet, I loved his attitude to sexual relations... even Stranger in a Strange Land and I Will Fear No Evil (which I also started-stopped but finished). Like to Zina, his libertarianism was refreshing. Unlike a lot of the present-day self-titled libertarians, for whom the main idea is not to pay taxes, RAH was behind such issues as blood banks and donor campaigns...

Do I see a lot of problems with his prose and attitudes now? Yes, definitely. Are there better SF authors today? Impossible to compare, the society has changed that much that what was daring progressive now feels reactionary. There are definitely a lot of better books today than some of RAH's, tens for each of his. But I'm still his fan, just less avid

I guess he works best if discovered by a teen, with less experience but need to discover more

Oleksandr wrote: "I loved his old grumpy men, who pontificate from every soapbox, ... the society has changed that much that what was daring progressive now feels reactionary"

Zina wrote: "I also really like a libertarian author, for a change. The Soviet Union upbringing gave me a bit of an allergy on its philosophies."

I loved his grumpy old men to the max. And I think Heinlein influenced my philosophy of life even in the juveniles, where honesty and hard work and so on are awarded.

As to the libertarianism, I don't think that the libertarians here are what libertarians started out to be. There's a guy here in my state who ran on the libertarian ticket for local office who was a serious Christianity right-wing guy. His church was in big trouble for not paying taxes . . . cannot remember if it was just unrelated business income (even churches can get taxed on business income not in line with its tax-exempt purpose), or if it was because it was a "church" not awarded tax-exempt status. In either case, his stances, taxwise and other, seemed different than Heinlein's libertarianism. Libertarianism seems to be real right wing now, which I didn't believe it to be back in the day.

and here I am talking about politics, which:
1) I know NOTHING about and
2) I don't ever want to talk about anyway!!!!!!

Zina wrote: "[Stranger] is still a powerful book, and it carries such feelings with it... I think the general thought exercise of what if the real God came to us (sent his son, whatever) right now - how would we collectively reject and abuse him - remains relevant and for all the bellyaching we lost the capacity to really love other humans even more than what they had in the 60s, not like I was there but anyway.

Thank you for writing this. It brought back memories me of how I felt about that book growing up. I do remember being so angry as a teenager (view spoiler)[ when Heinlein killed Mike off, (hide spoiler)] but now I see how the story had to go that way for resolution of the peace and love message.

Kateblue wrote: "As to the libertarianism, I don't think that the libertarians here are what libertarians started out to be.."

[bringing a soapbox, standing on it] Yes, libertarian ideas were right-wing anarchism (with what is usually called anarchism, including in such SF works as The Dispossessed: An Ambiguous Utopia being left-wing anarchism), in economics following ideas of the Austrian school, chief among which are Ludwig von Mises and Friedrich Hayek, which emerged as an opposition to Marxism, so if Marxism highlighted struggle betweeen groups, Libertarian idea was to highlight individuals and struggle against a faceless state, so that say The Trial: Franz Kafka - Bitig Books Classics while not libertarian shows the same idea (from the same Austria-Hungary). And if state = bad, they try to minimize/abolish it wherever possible. But they also highlight the rights of the individual, so religious dogmatism is an antithesis to them

I remember reading Prof, the revolutionary intellectual in The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, saying “I can get along with a Randite” when discussing his political philosophy. I read this at a time when I was very young and had never heard of Ayn Rand. Btw, for what it’s worth I think this was the best post-1960 novel. I think a lot of people would agree.

The book that fascinated me as a kid was Starship Troopers. For some reason I don’t think I really connected it with the real world and the Vietnam war, then ongoing (when I read it, not when it was written) and causing social strife in the USA. I guess I was living in a little world of my own and responded to the combination of adventure fiction, relative realism about military life, and passionate discussion of unconventional ideas. Heinlein wrote this as the next of his “juveniles” and he was very good at it.

I was never any kind of militarist or economic libertarian myself. I think I found aspects of Marxism more compelling than the reaction to it. My actual real world politics when I was young amounted to cautious nondoctrinaire centrism (in the Canadian context), moving leftward in the 80s. I never bought the Reagan/Thatcher revolution. These days I regard myself as a fairly old fashioned moderate egalitarian small-l liberal/social democrat, accepting a lot of left analysis but cautious about action in the real world.

Sorry if the political digression is unwelcome. If the mods want it gone just let me know and of sourse I’ll remove it.

Zina wrote: "You... didn't actually like the Stranger in a Strange land????? To the point of giving it one star... ?"

Even though Kateblue was quoted, I think this question was for me? Since I am the one who gave it one star, and who hates reading Heinlein.

I didn't like it *at all.* Maybe it's a factor of first experiencing this in my late 30s as opposed to being 13. But there is nothing I find appealing about Heinlein's proto-sigma soapbox men, his free-access sexual fantasies, his crappy plot pacing. I did not find it powerful at all. It's put me off reading more of his work, though Friday made me even less inclined than Stranger. It doesn't help that I find libertarianism, including Heinlein's libertarianism, ridiculous.

Stephen wrote: "Sorry if the political digression is unwelcome. If the mods want it gone just let me know and of sourse I’ll remove it."

No worries, it's fine. I think this group's approach has generally been that politics is fine when it comes up organically in relation to a book or an author, as long as it doesn't lead to negative interactions. It's very hard to talk about a lot of books on our list if politics are off limits. But some members choose not to engage on that level and that's fine too.

Wanted to join this conversation about the highly-regarded writer in question by quoting my review of The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress. Because I wrote it directly after reading the book, it much more vividly and accurately says anything I could attempt to write now:

“I admire Heinlein’s incredibly detailed, throughly considered approach to how a revolution could occur in the very specific and finely-drawn Lunar society he created. I love his creation of the AI character, Mike, and I wholeheartedly believe that he could exist as described.

But too often I could feel Heinlein’s deeply problematic attitudes about women (especially underage women, which was especially shocking), which he seemed to have attempted to leaven by making his women sparky and tough and willing to be whistled at, kissed, fondled, etc. It all was just a bit too icky for me.

All in all, reading this book amounted to an interesting time capsule experience for me, but one which left me uncomfortable a bit too often.”

For whatever it’s worth…

Stephen wrote: "The book that fascinated me as a kid was Starship Troopers. For some reason I don’t think I really connected it with the real world and the Vietnam war, then ongoing (when I read it, n..."

Stephen, I think you and I are contemporaries & closer to the era in which this book was popular, so our experiences & leanings are similar. My dad was military, a warhawk who worked at the Pentagon during the Vietnam War. My sister was the opposite, born in 1950, a wannabe hippie with liberal views. Seven years younger, I was caught between the two. But I didn't read Starship Troopers till about 1973 and Stranger in 1975, and like you, I didn't really connect them to those events. Maybe I was just too unworldly & inexperienced to make the connection. I read tons of military history too & looked at Troopers just as military SF, treating the philosophizing as part of the landscape. My political views now are perhaps stronger left because I'm in the U.S. Oddly, my sister is now strongly right wing. We just don't talk politics.

Wow, interesting to hear all your political philosophies. I guess I am glad I started it.

I realized years ago that nothing current politics can do can really help. The social order is too f***ed to be repaired by political means. You have to give people something to believe in and live for before the mess can get cleaned up.

That's when I stopped most personal activism and now always vote for the candidates I find less objectionable. Which, I think, is another Heinlein thing . . . when in doubt, vote against? I think I remember that, though I'm not sure what book, maybe The Number of the Beast

As a point of possible interest, my wife and I are currently visiting Quebec City. As I write this I am sitting in the Victorian English language library at https://www.morrin.org/en/.
The Heinlein books I see on the shelf are Friday, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, and The Original Uncut Stranger in a Strange Land.

There are women in the juveniles but no sex, and the books may be the better for it.

Stephen wrote: "Victorian English language library"

That place looks really great. Have fun.

Weird that The Cat Who Walks Through Walls is included. That is the clunkiest of the unreadable Heinleins IMHO

You do know that "The Original Uncut Stranger in a Strange Land" is the one where they put back a multitude of words that didn't really change anything, right? The previous edited version was better. Ah, Heinlein was a powerful man in his day.

Stephen wrote: "There are women in the juveniles but no sex, and the books may be the better for it."

Actually, there is not much sex in any of his books compared to what you run across daily in current books.

Kateblue wrote: "Wow, interesting to hear all your political philosophies. I guess I am glad I started it. "

A funny story about politics and SF. There was very little of foreign SF (and no fantasy) before perestroika. From a few English-writing SF authors maybe the most unusual choice was Ray Bradbury. According to unconfirmed rumors, publication of his books was backed because one of politburo members (Gromyko I guess) said that Fahrenheit 451 plainly showed that the USA is a fascist state because Nazi burned books. It is esp. curious because at that moment the author was politically closer to the US right, not left