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Book finished
Jun. 4th, 2011 10:16 amVariable Star by Robert Heinlein and Spider Robinson
That was REALLY good. I love Heinlein, I love Spider Robinson. This novel felt exactly like both of them, though a bit more Heinlein up front, especially the first 1/4 or so, morphing more into a collaboration later on.
I can't think of a single thing I didn't like about it. While reading it there were quite a number of times when I thought I knew what was going to happen. I was wrong every time. I LOVE that. Every time a surprise happened and I didn't like the surprise, I turned out to be wrong in not liking it. I love that too. There were times when I thought the plot was about to fall apart, or the language was wrong. Again, I was wrong.
There's nothing much I can say about it without creating spoilers.
The Wikipedia article cites some bad reviews, particularly of the first few chapters. I think the first few chapters are a clear homage to Heinlein juveniles. It reads exactly like one, with very little Spider Robinson visible. I think that was intentional. IMO if you don't like them, you probably think Heinlein's juveniles are bad too, and I think I join Spider in saying "to hell with you then, this book wasn't written for you."
My only regret about this book is that I can only ever read it for the first time once.
FWIW, bought from B&N as a Nook book, cracked, loaded onto the Sony 505, sold the Sony yesterday, finished on the new Nook Touch as the first book read (at least partially) on that device. More on the Nook 2 later in a separate post.
That was REALLY good. I love Heinlein, I love Spider Robinson. This novel felt exactly like both of them, though a bit more Heinlein up front, especially the first 1/4 or so, morphing more into a collaboration later on.
I can't think of a single thing I didn't like about it. While reading it there were quite a number of times when I thought I knew what was going to happen. I was wrong every time. I LOVE that. Every time a surprise happened and I didn't like the surprise, I turned out to be wrong in not liking it. I love that too. There were times when I thought the plot was about to fall apart, or the language was wrong. Again, I was wrong.
There's nothing much I can say about it without creating spoilers.
The Wikipedia article cites some bad reviews, particularly of the first few chapters. I think the first few chapters are a clear homage to Heinlein juveniles. It reads exactly like one, with very little Spider Robinson visible. I think that was intentional. IMO if you don't like them, you probably think Heinlein's juveniles are bad too, and I think I join Spider in saying "to hell with you then, this book wasn't written for you."
My only regret about this book is that I can only ever read it for the first time once.
FWIW, bought from B&N as a Nook book, cracked, loaded onto the Sony 505, sold the Sony yesterday, finished on the new Nook Touch as the first book read (at least partially) on that device. More on the Nook 2 later in a separate post.
