PODKAYNE OF MARS

Rating:
Summary: Heinlein's last book for young readers
Review: After a decade of writing novels for young people (known as juveniles back then -- today we'd call them young adult novels), Robert Heinlein came back to the form for one last shot. "Podkayne of Mars" is a charming story of a young girl's ambition to become the first female starship captain, and her travels to Venus with her uncle and her sociopathic genius of a younger brother. This edition puts together Heinlein's original ending, the rewritten published ending, and a spate of letters from fans arguing over their relative merits. I read the story first as a teenager with the gentler ending; I reread it recently with both endings. Personally, I think either ending works, although I generally think Heinlein knew what he was doing in the first place before editors started demanding cuts. A novel that promotes the idea of the equality of women, as well as a diatribe against racism, "Podkayne" was ahead of its time for 1963 (although the subjects were in the air the previous decade, they weren't in literature for young people at all). The argument at the end of the novel, blaming the mother and father for neglecting their children, has rubbed some people the wrong way; but the idea that one of the parents ought to be home raising the child isn't all that dangerous, is it? After all, a dominant majority of our prison population was raised without a father in the home, while the mother struggled. Good parenting creates good children; bad parenting, Heinlein is arguing, creates bad children. I, for one, don't object to Heinlein's literature carrying philosophical or moral arguments; they help me to think about my own positions, even when I disagree with Heinlein. In my opinion, Heinlein's tendency to have his characters voice strong opinions (which many label preaching), is precisely the reason we're still talking about him. There are many writers of his era who told great stories; there are few we're still bothering to read. "Podkayne of Mars" is a great story, but it's also a great argument: enjoy it on both counts, and feel free to disagree. I think Heinlein wanted it that way.

Rating:
Summary: Heinlein's last book for young readers
Review: After a decade of writing novels for young people (known as juveniles back then -- today we'd call them young adult novels), Robert Heinlein came back to the form for one last shot. "Podkayne of Mars" is a charming story of a young girl's ambition to become the first female starship captain, and her travels to Venus with her uncle and her sociopathic genius of a younger brother. This edition puts together Heinlein's original ending, the rewritten published ending, and a spate of letters from fans arguing over their relative merits. I read the story first as a teenager with the gentler ending; I reread it recently with both endings. Personally, I think either ending works, although I generally think Heinlein knew what he was doing in the first place before editors started demanding cuts. A novel that promotes the idea of the equality of women, as well as a diatribe against racism, "Podkayne" was ahead of its time for 1963 (although the subjects were in the air the previous decade, they weren't in literature for young people at all). The argument at the end of the novel, blaming the mother and father for neglecting their children, has rubbed some people the wrong way; but the idea that one of the parents ought to be home raising the child isn't all that dangerous, is it? After all, a dominant majority of our prison population was raised without a father in the home, while the mother struggled. Good parenting creates good children; bad parenting, Heinlein is arguing, creates bad children. I, for one, don't object to Heinlein's literature carrying philosophical or moral arguments; they help me to think about my own positions, even when I disagree with Heinlein. In my opinion, Heinlein's tendency to have his characters voice strong opinions (which many label preaching), is precisely the reason we're still talking about him. There are many writers of his era who told great stories; there are few we're still bothering to read. "Podkayne of Mars" is a great story, but it's also a great argument: enjoy it on both counts, and feel free to disagree. I think Heinlein wanted it that way.

Rating:
Summary: I say it's spinach
Review: And if it were anybody but Heinlein, I'd say the hell with it.

All right, look -- between 1959 and 1964 Heinlein wrote what I regard as his three _preachiest_ books: _Starship Troopers_, _Farnham's Freehold_, and this one. _Troopers_ and _Farnham_, whatever their flaws (and I think _Farnham_ is a much, much worse book than _Troopers_), were about subjects in which Heinlein had some expertise -- respectively, military service and surviving a nuclear attack. But Heinlein was never a _parent_ anywhere but in his dreams.

And yet -- in this sorta-juvenile novel ostensibly about young Podkayne Fries of Mars but actually, albeit indirectly, about her younger brother Clark -- there he is up on his soapbox, blaming Mom for not staying home with the kids. _That_, y'see, is why the terrible thing happens to Poddy at the end, and why Clarkie is turning out to be such a sociopath: their mother was just too busy with her _career_. (As an engineer.)

_Which_ terrible thing happens to Poddy depends on which ending you read. As Heinlein originally wrote it, she died; as he _re_wrote it (at Putnam's behest), she was merely comatose, with every hope of recovery. In the most recent PB edition of the novel, both ending are included, along with a bunch of comments/votes from readers who had much stronger feelings about the matter than I do.

Call me an ol' sourpuss, but I don't even especially _like_ Poddy. She's sorta cute in a late-50s kiddie-lit way, but the folks who say this book is dated are entirely right. Frankly, I don't really care one way or the other about the ending.

Not that there isn't any good stuff in this book at all. The plot's okay, and Clark really doesn't strike me as all that terrible a kid (he certainly isn't any worse than young Woodie Smith). But geez, the heavy-handed stump-sermonizing is just impossible to take with a straight face. (How many kids did Heinlein raise? If you guessed 'zero', you are exactly right. Few of us actual working parents out here really need his advice on the subject; fewer still deserve to be blamed by his surly moralism.)

Not, then, one of the Master's finest works. But just because it's his, it has enough interesting stuff in it that I reread it once in a _very_ long while.

Rating:
Summary: No option for "negative" numbers of stars, sadly
Review: Even though this is possibly the worst juvenile sci fi novel about a girl EVER WRITTEN, I feel I had to leave a comment here: this book changed my life. Remember the old "Ms." magazine and how they used to do articles about how various women had a "click" moment where their sensibilities about feminism snapped into place? Well, PODKAYNE OF MARS was my click moment. It made me a feminist. The year was 1963, and this was a brand new book by one of my favorite sci fi authors and it was about a girl! A girl who wanted to be a starship captain! I had to wait weeks for the book to come in, and rushed home to read it.

Imagine my disappointment! I could literally spend all day just pointing out the bad spots -- the lame characterizations, dull expository, lecturing, etc. But of course the worst thing here is that the book is utterly demeaning to young women. Poddy is a painful charicture of a teenager, with all kinds of agonizingly cute mannerisms. She actually thinks of herself as "an astonished kitten", and never interacts with a man, not even her elderly great uncle without knowingly flirting.

I have absolutely nothing against a book about a young woman who wishes to become a mother or raise children -- it's a perfeclty noble ambition. But why set us up for an adventurous tale about a girl starship captain and then have her be this simpering little priss?

Obviously Heinlein was bored with Poddy by the end of the first chapter and really wanted to tell the story of her bratty brother. Did some editor press him into writing a story for girls, when he really had no interest? (He never did write female characters particularly well, and we are all aware of his atavistic attitudes towards women in general.)

The story is plenty bad in other ways...there is no real plot or conflict. Mainly, Poddy, Clark and Uncle Tom travel to Venus on a luxury starship reminiscent of the QEII and mainly full of dull, rich elderly people. When she isn't flirting with older men (yeeccch) the "astonished kitten" is looking after babies in a nursery mainly for the "lower class" steerage type passengers. This activity is what causes her to change her mind about being a space pilot -- after "who would hire a female pilot, even if you were four times better than a man?" -- and decide maybe she will be a pediactric nurse instead. (God forbid, she think about being an actual PEDIATRICIAN.) Or maybe she will get into space travel by MARRYING a pilot.

On top of all this, there is little that is interesting in a sci fi context -- the ship seems like an ordinary ocean liner, the Venusville setting doesn't seem much different than contemporary Las Vegas.

So what is the point? Just to slam the ambitions of young female readers and point them firmly towards motherhood? Even worse is the treatment of Poddy's parents, who get a firm talking-to, courtesy of Uncle Tom (as mouthpiece for Heinlein himself), letting them know they are awful parents because they allow a 16 year old girl to travel with her brother and uncle and presumably don't keep her at home with a full time mom. Clearly they are the cause of her death (or awful accident)!!! Poddy's mom's wonderful career is built up and then largely made fun of or dismissed.

The whole "ending" controversy is blown out of proportion. So Poddy is either dead...or in a vegative coma. So what? If she wasn't, we'd have to gang up and kill her ourselves.

One of the rare books that really ought to be burnt in your basement incinerator. Not suitable for anyone of any age.

Rating:
Summary: Great story - but how does it end?
Review: First, I think this is yet another Heinlein great. There are two versions of this book on the market. The difference between them is how the story ends. Heinlein originally wrote a particular ending, the publisher didn't like it and talked Heinlein into changing it. Later, a publishing company (I don't recall which) had a contest. People read both endings of the book. The original manuscript ending, and the first published version. They then wrote essays arguing for which version to print in a new paperback edition. They decided to include both endings, so now you can decide for yourself. But read the book at any rate. If you want another Heinlein with a female central character, try Friday and To Sail Beyond the Sunset. Of course the women in those books don't have the innocent child-like character of Podkayne.

Rating:
Summary: This is a masterpiece from the Grand Master of SciFi
Review: For those of you calling Podkayne Fries a moron, an oh so cute teenager, that she deserved what happened, and calling this book a "beginning of the end" I have a few things to explain. I first read this book when I was probably fifteen and Poddy Fries quickly became one of my best friends. She was confident, funny, and smart-yes SMART!! This is an awesome book. In some minds it may not compare to Stranger in a Strange Land or his other masterpieces, but in my eye's this is the masterpiece. This was written for children, and it teaches them a good lesson-life can't always be happy. This is a fun, sweet, and innocent book. In a world full of hypocrites, drugs, violence, and sex this is just what our youth needs.

Rating:
Summary: A fine work by Heinlein that displays the morals of his time
Review: Heinlein's excellent work, whose title character is a young girl with star pilot ambitions in a solar system where girls just don't do that kind of thing. She and her brother, Clark, an eleven year old amoral supergenius, are being raised by two distracted parents on Mars, but are closer to their Uncle Tom, a (seemingly) retired politician. They wind up in Tom's care on a tour to Venus and Earth. However, Tom seems busy with other things, meeting important people, etc. The kids are left to their own devices. Between the vortex around Tom, and the kids' natural tendencies for mischief, trouble is inevitable.

As has been pointed out in other reviews, this is really Clark's story, his evolution from amoral supergenius to a point where he is starting to care about other beings. There are alternate endings, one was not thought suitable and Heinlein was forced to edit it, now both are in the book. But both endings show Clark starting to care about others than himself. And this is really the point.

Clark is the sort of kid that most of Heinlein's preteen target audience would be just delighted to be. The kids who read Heinlein weren't much interested, at that point in their development, in sports or girls. A rather evil electronics genius who outsmarts adults with impunity, reprograms food robots to serve him unlimited free snacks, and outsmarts a casino, is just what these kids would like to be. While no doubt such a reader would take some interest in Podkayne as necessary to the plot, they would be most interested in Clark's antics.

Yet Clark makes mistakes, through overconfidence in his genius, and those mistakes have consequences for himself and Podkayne, in either ending. He owns up on this to Tom, who "is gentle with" him, as Clark wishes Tom would hit him. Clark realizes, and his readers realize with him, that there is such a thing as adult responsibility for mistakes, that you just have to live with, and that cannot be erased by a spanking. Clark will just have to live with the consequences of his mistakes. From what we can tell, this is a first for Clark, and it seems to change him a bit, giving us hope that Clark will be an adult who is able to exist within society. He is able to care emotionally for Podkayne, and for the small pet she has adopted and protected, Ariel, and who he cares for physically as her surrogate.

This is a coming of age story not for Podkayne, whose personality changes little though the book, but rather for Clark. Doubtlessly, few of the preteen readers realized it at the time, but they probably did in rereading as adults.

Not his best, but still, very, very, good.

Rating:
Summary: A fine work by Heinlein that displays the morals of his time
Review: Heinlein's excellent work, whose title character is a young girl with star pilot ambitions in a solar system where girls just don't do that kind of thing. She and her brother, Clark, an eleven year old amoral supergenius, are being raised by two distracted parents on Mars, but are closer to their Uncle Tom, a (seemingly) retired politician. They wind up in Tom's care on a tour to Venus and Earth. However, Tom seems busy with other things, meeting important people, etc. The kids are left to their own devices. Between the vortex around Tom, and the kids' natural tendencies for mischief, trouble is inevitable.

As has been pointed out in other reviews, this is really Clark's story, his evolution from amoral supergenius to a point where he is starting to care about other beings. There are alternate endings, one was not thought suitable and Heinlein was forced to edit it, now both are in the book. But both endings show Clark starting to care about others than himself. And this is really the point.

Clark is the sort of kid that most of Heinlein's preteen target audience would be just delighted to be. The kids who read Heinlein weren't much interested, at that point in their development, in sports or girls. A rather evil electronics genius who outsmarts adults with impunity, reprograms food robots to serve him unlimited free snacks, and outsmarts a casino, is just what these kids would like to be. While no doubt such a reader would take some interest in Podkayne as necessary to the plot, they would be most interested in Clark's antics.

Yet Clark makes mistakes, through overconfidence in his genius, and those mistakes have consequences for himself and Podkayne, in either ending. He owns up on this to Tom, who "is gentle with" him, as Clark wishes Tom would hit him. Clark realizes, and his readers realize with him, that there is such a thing as adult responsibility for mistakes, that you just have to live with, and that cannot be erased by a spanking. Clark will just have to live with the consequences of his mistakes. From what we can tell, this is a first for Clark, and it seems to change him a bit, giving us hope that Clark will be an adult who is able to exist within society. He is able to care emotionally for Podkayne, and for the small pet she has adopted and protected, Ariel, and who he cares for physically as her surrogate.

This is a coming of age story not for Podkayne, whose personality changes little though the book, but rather for Clark. Doubtlessly, few of the preteen readers realized it at the time, but they probably did in rereading as adults.

Not his best, but still, very, very, good.

Rating:
Summary: a STORY, not a manifesto!
Review: I first read this story as a teenager during the early '60s, and today, I put the same spin on it that I did back then. Podkayne is a smart if somewhat naiive young chick with an equally-smart kid brother with pretensions to world-weariness (he's a believer in Goethe's "One must the hammer or the anvil be"--or thinks he is anyway). Despite that, he's just as much a product of a sheltered life as Sis. They go through all the dilemmas of adolescence and pre-adolescence, and a few years later, I couldn't help but compare them to "The Patty Duke Show" on TV. Podkayne and Clark are an interplanetary Patty and Ross. I don't care what decade this is, I refuse to see this book as gender-political. It isn't set in the '60s I grew up in, nor the '90s--it's set well beyond the Millennium. I can be just as political as the next guy, but it seems like one nasty after effect of the punk rock era is that all entertainment is now examined for ideological clues. Me, I guess I'm a dinosaur--I listen to a record for the MUSIC and read a book for the STORY. In each case, it keeps me from being bored--that's all the "relevant" I need.

Rating:
Summary: Good, clean fun
Review: I read and loved this book (with the gentler ending) when I was in junior high school. I found it a fun adventure, much like "Have Spacesuit, Will Travel." Poddy and Clark are two smart, capable kids who go from one adventure into an even bigger one, and ultimately save the day.

I didn't see a moral message about absentee parents. There is one comment that Poddy's uncle makes to her parents at the end; however, her parents never get the chance to reply. In the family I saw, Poddy loves her family very much and is very proud of them, and her family loves her back, including her parents, her brother (even thought he wouldn't admit it), and her uncle. Yes, Clark does have some odd social quirks, but that does not make him a sociopath. His pranks are either harmless or well deserved (and are fun to read).

If you liked this novel, try Heinlein's short story "The Meanace from Earth", which is about a girl with aspirations similar to Poddy's.