Rating: 
Summary: Hard-nosed, yet compassionate
Review: When all is said and done, you can't help respecting Robert Heinlein. The man knew what he wanted to say, and by jiminy he went out there and said it... This book, along with "Grumbles from the Grave," probably cleaves closer to the heart of Heinlein's spirit than any three of his other books combined. It is a collection of short pieces: some nonfiction articles; others, slightly fictionalized accounts of very real political concerns. My favorite piece is "Solution Unsatisfactory," which was one of the earliest pieces in science fiction to deal so intelligently with the threat of nuclear war. Heinlein also includes a few accounts of trips that he and his wife made to the Soviet Union. They really tried hard to be open-eyed, open-minded observers of everything they saw. Things have changed in Russia since they were there, but it's worth reading just to sate one's appetite for Heinlein's distinctive voice. (For anyone interested in more up-to-date accounts of Russia, read anything by David Shipler.) Heinlein's time at Annapolis shows through in many of these pieces, as it does in virtually everything else he wrote. He seemed to have a very, very clear sense of America as a "country," or even as a "nation," as opposed to a "society." What I mean by this is that many of these pieces reflect a powerful understanding of the fundamental reality that America is a MILITARY entity, apart from being an economic juggernaut and a staunch promoter, on the international scene, of youth culture and our entertainment-based value system. Heinlein's military and political understanding is a disturbing one, but it is more securely grounded in serious, military realities than that of most authors writing today.The pre-eminent concern in "Expanded Universe" is the threat of nuclear war. Heinlein, as anyone familiar with his writings will know, wrote firmly out of the Cold War tradition. "Solution Unsatisfactory" is the best example of this kind of thinking in this volume. Personally, I'd like to interject, I see absolutely no correlation whatsoever between the end of the Cold War and any putative decrease in the threat to mankind posed by nuclear weapons. I, for one, couldn't care less whether the dude aiming MIRV missiles at my kitchen speaks Russian, Arabic, Chinese, or, heck, even Navajo -- the point is that armed conflict will always exist, and now that nuclear weapons exist too, the clock is frankly ticking away the last seconds/hours/days/years/decades (decades? Let's hope so...) on mankind's time remaining on Earth. For anyone who is genuinely disturbed by Heinlein's ideas, I want to make a few recommendations. Try to find a copy of "Nuclear Shelterist," by Walton McCarthy. It's out of print right now, but it's obviously worth trying to track down. Ask your friendly local librarian for help in finding it. Also -- if you can locate a copy of the British movie "Threads," you should see it. It's extremely frightening and graphic -- do NOT watch it with your kids in the house. I'm very serious about that. That said, it is an absolutely uncompromising overview of the currently accepted, likely aftermath of a nuclear war, extrapolated over a period of thirteen years after the war happens. It's horrifying enough that it might prompt you to get involved in some way. You might have to search a little to find the video -- not all video stores carry it. However, fifteen minutes of calling all the video stores in the yellow pages will probably be enough to track it down. Finally, I'd like to recommend "Hydroponic Home Food Gardens," by Howard Resh. If we ever have a nuclear war, indoor hydroponic gardens will be just about the only way of growing food successfully, and people who have them will have a VASTLY higher chance of surviving the worldwide economic chaos and food shortages which will definitely follow such a war. Whether you would actually be glad you survived is, of course, another question. Well, I just wanted to make a little contribution, online, to the kind of concerns that Heinlein wrote about in "Expanded Universe." I like to think that he would have approved of my passing on those tips... Anyway, this book is fantastic. Buy it, please, and get copies for your friends. People need to be more aware of this stuff. I give this book seven hundred billion thumbs up.
Rating:
Summary: Heinlein's done it again
Review: Yet another work of art from Heinlein himself. I've read some other novels by him (Starship Troopers, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, Red Planet) and this one is great! It's like driving through the brain of a mental patiant. With great works of sci fi and old stories.. It's fun to read over and over again.
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