☰

Top

Between Planets

by Robert A. Heinlein, 1951

Published: 2021.04.17

Home > Book Reviews > Robert A. Heinlein > Between Planets

 

Cover art by Darrell K. Sweet
Photo by Wil C. Fry

★★★ (of 5)

 

Summary

One of Heinlein’s juveniles, Between Planets shares similar features with several other books he published around the same time period, but isn’t part of a consistent timeline with any of the others. It was later (1978) serialized as a cartoon in Boys’ Life magazine.

The third-person narrative follows the perspective of Don Harvey, the son of space-traveling scientists parents currently working on Mars. Don is close to finishing high school on Earth when the story begins, but receives a message from his parents, saying they have withdrawn him early from his final school term and paid for his immediate passage to Mars. First, though, he’s given a package by an old family friend, who says it’s imperative that he deliver the package to his parents. But Don never makes it to Mars, because the colonists on Venus start their war for independence around that time, messing up space travel around the solar system and diverting Don (against his strong wishes) to Venus, where he encounters a series of adventures and misfortunes as he becomes an adult. It ends with him (spoiler alert) playing a big part in saving the day.

As in Space Cadet, there are intelligent natives on Venus, which is swampy but inhabitable by humans. And, as in Red Planet, there are intelligent natives on Mars, which is also (barely) able to support life. Neither of the two species are those found in other books, however.

 

The Good

The story moves at a rapid clip, light on descriptions and backstory, but does include plenty of Don’s inner dialog. This is a rare Heinlein juvenile that holds science and technology talk to a minimum, focusing instead on events and Don’s reactions to them.

Historical parallels are evident (and occasionally outright mentioned), and I think they’re introduced reasonably and fairly. For example, one man explains his theory that the powers-that-be on Earth resemble the British Empire of the 1700s, while the colonists on Venus are similar to the revolutionaries in the early United States.

Despite the U.S. Revolutionary War metaphor, in this story, the human rebels on Venus are respectful of the indigenous species — Don himself lived there as a young boy and knows some of their language, befriending a Venus “dragon” early in the story. This is one thing that’s relatively consistent in Heinlein’s stories, especially the juveniles: the protagonists always differ from the bad guys in the way they treat indigenous peoples and cultures on new planets. The good guys are always loathe to take from, harm, or even inconvenience the natives, while the antagonists can be spotted a mile away by their indifference to, or hatred of, the original inhabitants of the planet(s).

 

The Disappointing

For the most part, this book is exactly what it’s supposed to be: a space travel adventure story for 1950s teens. In that respect there is little of which to complain.

Still, I felt that the story was all over the place. Often Don isn’t faced with choices, but with unavoidable circumstances which he has to go along with — which, yes, is fairly realistic for people who aren’t adults yet, but it took something from the story. Just as it seems one dependable storyline is developing, it goes somewhere else — something surprising happens to Don and he has to deal with it as best he can. Now that I’m writing this paragraph, I can see how constructing a story in this way might be a positive rather than a negative, but it felt chaotic at times. Maybe that’s what he was going for.

The plot also seemed contrived (and happened mostly outside Don’s viewpoint). A secret consortium of scientists has uncovered some ancient knowledge from a civilization that existed in the Solar System prior to human dominance — they want to keep this information from the authorities on Earth — who are growing too powerful and controlling for anyone’s good. The secret package with which Don is entrusted contains a secret message from “The Organization” on Earth to the organization’s members on Mars. (And, of course, since Don doesn’t make it to Mars, it has to be picked up on Venus.) Don doesn’t know about this message, but protects the package out of principle. It turns out that the message is scientific knowledge that changes everything.

 

For Its Time...

In my experience, science fiction from the 1940s and ‘50s — even some of Heinlein’s — focuses mainly on white males, either leaving out entirely or poorly treating women and anyone who isn’t Anglo-Saxon. This one stands out for doing neither. There is a competent woman among the main characters, women are common and accepted among the scientists and engineers on Venus (and elsewhere in the solar system — like Don’s own mother). Only the military aspect seems to be entirely male. Heinlein also draws attention to the many Asian people among the human inhabitants of Venus, developing at least one of those characters far enough to be Don’s boss, advisor, and friend. (I don’t think he says outright, but it looks like he was drawing a historical parallel here to the many Chinese laborers who came to the U.S. in the late 1800s.)

 

Conclusion

This was fun and quick — a nice dessert after the heavy meal that was Dune, but ultimately didn’t have enough substance to be memorable. (I’m certain I read it before, but I remembered nothing as I read through it again.)

 





comments powered by Disqus