This isn’t really much of a review, and I really should head off to bed – morning comes so soon! – so you might want to head over to E. Heinlein’s consistent popularity through the decades – most of his novels are still in print and selling very well indeed – argues for some twinkles of gold amidst the dross. This plot sounds as goofy as all get out, and it really is, but there is some solid writing for the genre in there too. Planetary disaster! The aliens must be stopped! (Save the President!) After some chapters of non-stop action – including a week off for passionate lovemaking between Secret Agents Number Two (a young man of almost superhuman strategy, fighting and survival skills) and Secret Agent Number Three (his female counterpart, with the added bonus of being built, beautiful, willing, silent, etcetera) the weak spot of the slug-creatures is discovered, and invasion mop-up begins.
The slugs (as they are soon nicknamed by the humans still not under the influence) seem to be able to replicate quickly, and are very quick to utilize what they are learning from their hosts to further their invasion. Strange, mollusc-like creatures are parasitizing humans, nestling along their spines and controlling their thoughts and actions. Scenting danger, a trio of state security secret agents heads for the site of the mystery spaceship, and discovers something exceedingly unsettling. When transmission resumes, it’s all very, “Ha ha ha! Just a couple of teenagers pulling off an elaborate hoax! Nothing to see here, folks, nothing to see…” Initial radio reports from the scene indicate that the occupants are alive and … then … silence.
Flying saucer sightings have recently been reported all over the U.S.A., and one is discovered to be on the ground in the country outside Des Moines, Iowa. (Remembering that it was written in 1951, so the action is set some six decades in the future.) Misogynistic attitudes possibly put aside – though I’ve met a disturbingly large number of these folks, both male and female, who have vintage 1950s’-type views on the equality of the sexes – today’s “libertarians” seem to have ideological views right on par with Heinlein’s, so I guess you might say he was ahead of his time – or a product of his time? – in regards to his frequently trotted out diatribes on the dangers of socialism.īut on to the story. His ideal female? Built, beautiful, sexually willing, good in the kitchen and very, very quiet.
Mostly for his patronizingly chauvinistic views towards women. I found some of his more extreme libertarian and offhandedly sexist views a bit problematic way back then, but kept reading because of the storytelling – it was pretty darned good for sci-fi for its time. 175 pages.įlashback to the school library rotating paperback rack!
0 kommentar(er)
