John C. Wright's Journal

Have Space Suit, Will Travel
Continuing my stroll down memory lane, I am rereading some Heinlein I enjoyed in my youth. My lovely wife just presented me with a handsomely-bound copy of OUTWARD BOUND, a three-in-one edition put out by the SF Book Club containing HAVE SPACE SUIT, WILL TRAVEL, and STARSHIP TROOPERS and PODKAYNE OF MARS.

HAVE SPACE SUIT is the first science fiction book I ever read. It was loaned to me by a friend of my father's who had a big crate full of paperbacks. My father was navy; sailors often collect a healthy number of paperbacks that they carry and read on cruise. My reading tastes at that age were books like YOUNG DANIEL BOONE And THREE BOYS IN A HELICOPTER And TOM SWIFT AND HIS TRIPHIBIOUS ATOMOCAR. I still remember the cover art: the heads of Fatty and Skinny and the horrible insectoid skull of Wormface hovering above the earth; in the foreground, out hero in his suit, Oscar. (Thanks to the miracle of the information age, I can find the very pic:

My take on it now? Good, solid workmanlike product from the Dean of SF. Only one thing that rubbed me the wrong way.

MANY SPOILERS BELOW THE CUT

( more here )
This is one of Heinlein’s better juveniles, and I read it with almost as much pleasure as in my youth.

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