Podkayne of Mars (Mass Market Paperback)

~ Robert Heinlein (Author) "All my life I've wanted to go to Earth..." (more)
Key Phrases: Uncle Tom, Captain Darling, Hermes Station (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A girl raised on Mars travels back to Earth in Heinlein's vintage SF tale, first published in 1963.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

'Heinlein's skill...makes this story a delight.' New York Herald Tribune --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Baen; Reprint edition (July 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671876716
• ISBN-13: 978-0671876715
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.2 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #913,312 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not a juvenile novel!, January 20, 2008

By	Edward E. Rom (Mankato, MN United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Podkayne of Mars (Digest Size) (Ace Science Fiction) (Paperback)

Before I actually review this novel, I must clear up a commonly-held misconception: _Podkayne of Mars_ is not a juvenile novel! When I was at the Heinlein Centennial last summer, Dr. Robert James (a leading Heinlein scholar) read the backcover blurb from the first paperback edition, which made this very obvious: juvenile novels are not marketed with phrases such as "the Minx from Mars." Dr. James is evidently irritated with people continually referring to this as a juvenile...

The last unambiguously juvenile novel was _Have Spacesuit, Will Travel_. _Starship Troopers_ is supposedly a juvenile, but I really have my doubts. _Podkayne_ is a novel that comes early in the period in which Heinlein was finally writing more or less what he wanted, rather than writing for specific markets.

The entire book is composed of Podkayne's diary, with a couple of secret entries made by her younger brother Clark, in invisible ink. The reason for this is obvious once you have read the book: no spoilers here!

The story is about Podkayne and her younger brother Clark accompanying their Uncle Tom on a trip to Venus and then to Earth (the trip never gets past Venus). There's a lot more here than meets the eye, because Tom is actually on a secret diplomatic mission to the upcoming Three Planets conference, and Poddy and Clark are along just to provide cover.

At first everything seems to be perfectly innocent, but then a stranger gets Clark to smuggle a package on board the spaceliner. Clark is a lot smarter than the stranger gives him credit for; the kid figures out that he's been given an atomic bomb that's been set to go off shortly after they leave Mars. Clark, being a boy genius, finds a way to defuse it. The plot gets thicker from there -- for the most part the story seems like an innocent travelogue of the future, but here and there the reader gets intimations of skulduggery afoot. By the end of the book, the plot has thickened to a perfect and satisfying consistency.

There has been some controversy regarding this book, regarding the ending. The edition I have on my desk in front of me right now is the Baen Books paperback printing of July 1995 (the hardcover was August 1993), which has both Heinlein's original ending as well as the changed ending which appeared in all editions from 1963 until 1993. It's a pretty good story with either ending, but I like Heinlein's original ending better.

Before I end this, I'm going to make a short quote from a letter from Heinlein to Lurton Blassingame, his agent, dated Mar. 10, 1962:
"Is _Poddy_ a juvenile? I didn't think of it as such and I suggest that it violates numerous taboos for the juvenile market."

Having said that, I have to say that I highly recommend this book, as I do almost everything that Heinlein wrote. I'm still not sure, after all these years, what it is that Heinlein put into his stories to make them so engaging, readable, and downright fun, but there it is: Heinlein was the greatest of all the science fiction writers so far, and he never wrote a dull tale.

16 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Heinlein's last book for young readers, July 24, 2000

By	Robert James (Culver City, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

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.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The (Un)-Saintly Martian, July 10, 2002

By	Patrick Shepherd "hyperpat" (San Jose, CA USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This was the last of the Heinlein `juveniles', the only one written with a female point-of-view character, and the only one not subject to the editorial dictates of a certain prudish editor at Scribners, though it still suffered at the hands of the editor at Putnam (more of which later).

Podkayne (named after a Martain saint, but just "Poddy" to her friends) and her younger amoral genius-level brother Clark get to take a trip to Earth with a side stop at Venus accompanied only by their retired Martian senator uncle Tom, as their parents are unexpectedly having to deal with three newly decanted babies due to a crèche mix-up. Most of the story is a detailing of the events during their journey on the spaceship and the sights, people, and society of Venus, as carefully recorded in Poddy's diary (with occasional inserts by Clark). This method of telling a story is difficult to do effectively, but for the most part it comes across very well in this book.

Poddy is a very likeable, friendly person who is, unfortunately, a little too naïve, a little too cute, a little too much preoccupied with babies, boys, and proving herself to be `just as good as a man' to be quite believable as a (supposedly) highly intelligent but otherwise normal teen-age girl. Clark, on the other hand, is all too believable as a boy with adult knowledge and a child's `me' centered view of the universe. Clark is the prime mover of the events, but for the most part he remains offstage, and we only learn about what he has done as filtered by Poddy's perceptions. Clearly the most interesting character in the book, his actions, mistakes, and emotional development fit well with the thematic line that Heinlein is presenting, on the responsibilities of parenting, an individual's own responsibility for his actions regardless of external factors, on the importance of one's relations and duties to others.

Along the way, Heinlein does his typical excellent job of describing the scientific aspects of space flight and navigation in a manner that consistently remains interesting, comprehensible, and accurate. Also part of the Heinlein territory are his comments on population control, gambling, unfettered capitalism, the art of politics, racial prejudice, the attitudes of the `moneyed' class towards their `inferiors', and prostitution - an item that would never have gotten by his editor at Scribners.

The ending of this book has caused a fair amount of controversy. At the insistence of his publisher, Heinlein was forced to change his original ending to one that was far less traumatic, an `all ends well' type ending, as this was, after all, a 'children's book'. In so doing, however, the thematic line and Clark's development do not reach full closure. This edition of the book has both Heinlein's original ending and the changed ending, along with multiple essays and comments from readers about the pros and cons of each ending. For my money, Heinlein's original ending is considerably better, even though it probably makes the book unsuitable for very young readers, dealing with the consequences of actions, death, and the harshness of the universe towards stupidity, but the average teenager should have not only have no problem with it, I think they will find it more believable, more true to life.

Not his best, but certainly eminently readable and enjoyable by both teens and adults, and still better than ninety percent of all the other material on the racks.