Time for the Stars

Rating:
Summary: Typical early Heinlein
Review: Telling the story of two telepathic twins who are hired to serve as the means of communication between intergalactic starships ( one stays behind, the other leaves in the ship ), this book has all the good stuff of early Heinlein. Lots of his off-handed comments about everything from psychology to relationships, it is also a nice and quite realistic story about the scope of real inter-GALACTIC exploration.

Rating:
Summary: Swift entertainment
Review: This book goes to show you the different attitudes prevailing in SF compared between the fifties when this book was written and the ideas today. Today, if someone took the concept of twins being separated by relativistic effects (ie one ages faster than the other . . . go read a physics textbook for the equations) it'd be a massive complex novel detailing the cultural shock and changes, the emotional cost, and mostly have a really downer attitude about it, treating it, for the most part "realistically" whatever that's supposed to mean in science fiction. But that's now and we're talking about then. Here Heinlein takes two vastly different concepts, telepathy between twins and the travelling between the stars in ships moving at barely sub-light speeds. The focus here is on both SF adventure and what it means to leave everything you know and have not only your entire family grow old and die while you age much slower but have the whole world change (Heinlein's future slang is a gas), while you stay the same. It's a fun story, and the main character, the twin that goes, narrates his story somberly but still with a dash of zest in his voice, for all the regret he feels at being left behind, he's having a grand adventure and seeing things that no one else has ever seen. Not that it's all fun and games and a lot of things happen before the mission is over, some good and some bad. Like I said, it's a light story, you won't find anything totally deep here but it's all handled capably, as you'd imagine a master like Heinlein dealing with this . . . but please don't read it as a gender study guide and keep in mind that it was written in the fifties, when women weren't expected to do all that much. Asking permission from your husband for just about everything was the order of the day mostly . . . just don't let it bother you. Other than that, it's good solid fun, though the ending comes totally out of left field (unless I missed something), but it's a great example of the golden age of SF, when anything seemed possible. For those who want a slightly darker take on the same subject . . . go read Joe Haldeman's The Forever War and that should knock the depress-o-meter right off the scale. Still a good book though. They're both good. Read them both, now!

Rating:
Summary: Swift entertainment
Review: This book goes to show you the different attitudes prevailing in SF compared between the fifties when this book was written and the ideas today. Today, if someone took the concept of twins being separated by relativistic effects (ie one ages faster than the other . . . go read a physics textbook for the equations) it'd be a massive complex novel detailing the cultural shock and changes, the emotional cost, and mostly have a really downer attitude about it, treating it, for the most part "realistically" whatever that's supposed to mean in science fiction. But that's now and we're talking about then. Here Heinlein takes two vastly different concepts, telepathy between twins and the travelling between the stars in ships moving at barely sub-light speeds. The focus here is on both SF adventure and what it means to leave everything you know and have not only your entire family grow old and die while you age much slower but have the whole world change (Heinlein's future slang is a gas), while you stay the same. It's a fun story, and the main character, the twin that goes, narrates his story somberly but still with a dash of zest in his voice, for all the regret he feels at being left behind, he's having a grand adventure and seeing things that no one else has ever seen. Not that it's all fun and games and a lot of things happen before the mission is over, some good and some bad. Like I said, it's a light story, you won't find anything totally deep here but it's all handled capably, as you'd imagine a master like Heinlein dealing with this . . . but please don't read it as a gender study guide and keep in mind that it was written in the fifties, when women weren't expected to do all that much. Asking permission from your husband for just about everything was the order of the day mostly . . . just don't let it bother you. Other than that, it's good solid fun, though the ending comes totally out of left field (unless I missed something), but it's a great example of the golden age of SF, when anything seemed possible. For those who want a slightly darker take on the same subject . . . go read Joe Haldeman's The Forever War and that should knock the depress-o-meter right off the scale. Still a good book though. They're both good. Read them both, now!

Rating:
Summary: One of his more interesting juveniles
Review: This is, in some ways, Heinlein's most ambitious juvenile. Most of his juvies are great, fast-paced, somewhat light-hearted adventure novels, but this one is somewhat more serious. There's enough action to keep anyone interested, to be sure, but the main part of the novel - the meat - rests with psychological extrapolation and pontification. This is the most deeply psychological novel that Heinlein ever wrote, including the supposedly more advanced "adult" novels. The story involves two telepathically linked twins who are separated by a span of light years when one goes off on a space ship and the other must stay behind. Tom, one of the twins, is long used to being manipulated by his brother Pat. This book is, essentially, his coming-of-age story - perhaps it's not as good as Citizen of The Galaxy or Tunnel In The Sky in that sense, but it is still quite good. We see Tom grow up and become a man, having, in the interim, to shuck off the long, dark shadow of his brother and take on the responsibilities of life himself. There isn't as much action in this story as one would normally expect; the heart of the story are the discussions on matters psychological, as well as a lot about relativity, the human mind and epistemology, and such starker matters as the organization of space ships and family politics (we all know Heinlein loved to preach.) This was one of the first books to really show the psychological effects of relativity in practice during long space voyages. We see the twin who goes stay young while the one back home grows old... and what ensues. Ultimately, the slightly difficult - comparatively - subject matter of this book and general lesser reliance on action to RAH's other juvenile books makes this one perhaps not the best one to start with (try Red Planet, Citizen of The Galaxy, or Tunnel In The Sky for that), but one that any Heinlein fan will love.

Rating:
Summary: It is a cool 60's view of space travel in the future
Review: This story has some odd gaps in the story line, such as the overpopulation of 9 billion people? well, it still is an excellent book worth reading if you want a space drama from the perspective on a country telepath.

Rating:
Summary: One Ages and One Doesn't
Review: Time for the Stars is one of my favorite books by Heinlein. Well written and an easy follower, it makes you think: Will we ever achieve something so great? I have read this book two times and it is one of those page-turners.

Rating:
Summary: Telepathic twins go their separate ways - earth & the stars!
Review: Time for the stars

This is a genuine science fiction story, where science has made something possible (interstellar travel, in this case) and the consequences on people is explored. Science fiction isn't often too thoughtful about that side of things, but this book goes some way to redressing that. It's an attractive book, one you'll want to read again. The characters are well developed and have depth, and the storyline is interesting.

And here it is: the Long-range Foundation is an outfit that specialises in long range projects, surprise, surprise. And their latest venture is interstellar exploration and colonisation. But how to maintain contact? Radio is no good, since the signal from a ship which has travelled fifty light years will take fifty years to get back. But, the Long-range Foundation has discovered that twins are often telepathic, the "reception" doesn't fade with distance, and best of all, it is instantaneous! So, leave one behind, put one on the ship, and you have the perfect communication service!

Or do you? Our heroes are Tom and Pat, to young twins who are tested and are discovered to be telepathic. So one goes, the other stays. The real story is ho they get on, where once they were inseparable, now they are divided by distance and time. Worse than that, the laws of relativity means that the earthbound one grows older faster - in the end, one is an old man, while the other has aged only a few years. How do they cope with a terrible wrench like that?

But don't worry! This is not just a thoughtful consideration of a human problem, there's plenty of technology, alien worlds and aliens, tragedy, love even! You get to see earth society develop over fifty years or so, with all the changes that that brings about. This is a very enjoyable and readable book, and one that I would highly recommend.

Rating:
Summary: Telepathic twins go their separate ways - earth & the stars!
Review: Time for the stars

This is a genuine science fiction story, where science has made something possible (interstellar travel, in this case) and the consequences on people is explored. Science fiction isn't often too thoughtful about that side of things, but this book goes some way to redressing that. It's an attractive book, one you'll want to read again. The characters are well developed and have depth, and the storyline is interesting.

And here it is: the Long-range Foundation is an outfit that specialises in long range projects, surprise, surprise. And their latest venture is interstellar exploration and colonisation. But how to maintain contact? Radio is no good, since the signal from a ship which has travelled fifty light years will take fifty years to get back. But, the Long-range Foundation has discovered that twins are often telepathic, the "reception" doesn't fade with distance, and best of all, it is instantaneous! So, leave one behind, put one on the ship, and you have the perfect communication service!

Or do you? Our heroes are Tom and Pat, to young twins who are tested and are discovered to be telepathic. So one goes, the other stays. The real story is ho they get on, where once they were inseparable, now they are divided by distance and time. Worse than that, the laws of relativity means that the earthbound one grows older faster - in the end, one is an old man, while the other has aged only a few years. How do they cope with a terrible wrench like that?

But don't worry! This is not just a thoughtful consideration of a human problem, there's plenty of technology, alien worlds and aliens, tragedy, love even! You get to see earth society develop over fifty years or so, with all the changes that that brings about. This is a very enjoyable and readable book, and one that I would highly recommend.