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bickleyhouse 's review for:
The Star Beast
by Robert A. Heinlein
adventurous
funny
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
It is my opinion that this book is brilliant. This is one of the juvenile Heinlein books that I had never read before I started my insane project to read all of the Grand Masters. I am firmly convinced that I will not live long enough to finish this project. Nevertheless, onward I tread.
Published in 1954, The Star Beast is a classic tale of a boy and his dog. Only it's not a dog. It's a . . . a . . . well, we really don't know what it is, do we? It's called "Lummox," sometimes "Lummie," and is a gigantic, virtually indestructible beast. And it talks. At the beginning, we are introduced to Lummox and a possibly adolescent boy named John Thomas Stuart, who lives with his mother. He is actually John Thomas Stuart XI. And Lummox was brought home from a space expedition flown by a distant ancestor of his, also named John Thomas Stuart. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 years ago.
Lummox has lived through a number of John Thomas Stuarts in its lifetime. Lummox is sentient so it is not exactly a "beast," even though it frequently behaves like one. There is no cage or structure made by man that can contain Lummox if it wants to get out. Usually, it will just eat part of the cage, but it can also simply burst through it.
Early on, Lummox gets in trouble, which drives the plot toward a trial in which a group of people want Lummie destroyed. Dangers, they claim. Which is only true if Lummie believes that his Johnny is threatened.
The Department of Spatial Affairs gets involved, along with the local government, and even those two entities don't agree on what needs to be done. At some point, the aliens show up. A race of aliens known as Hroshii show up demanding that their "she child" be returned to them. Of course, the authorities insist that they have no such thing on the planet.
The plot continues to thicken from there. The main characters, Stuart and his pseudo-girlfriend Betty (who fancies herself a lawyer and recently divorced herself from her parents), are lovable and hilarious, and great fun. Lummox is the most delightful science fiction character I have encountered since Willis in Red Planet. Of course, Lummie gets even more interesting when we discover what she is. (I believe I used a masculine pronoun earlier, but that is because, through the first half of the book, we all believe Lummox to be a "he.") And (spoiler alert) we also finally learn that the roles were seemingly reversed, and that John Thomas Stuart XI was actually Lummox's "hobby," as she had been actively raising John Thomas Stuarts for a couple of centuries!
Honestly, this may be my new favorite Robert Heinlein book. I'll have to see how much I still like Stranger when I get around to reading it again.
Published in 1954, The Star Beast is a classic tale of a boy and his dog. Only it's not a dog. It's a . . . a . . . well, we really don't know what it is, do we? It's called "Lummox," sometimes "Lummie," and is a gigantic, virtually indestructible beast. And it talks. At the beginning, we are introduced to Lummox and a possibly adolescent boy named John Thomas Stuart, who lives with his mother. He is actually John Thomas Stuart XI. And Lummox was brought home from a space expedition flown by a distant ancestor of his, also named John Thomas Stuart. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 200 years ago.
Lummox has lived through a number of John Thomas Stuarts in its lifetime. Lummox is sentient so it is not exactly a "beast," even though it frequently behaves like one. There is no cage or structure made by man that can contain Lummox if it wants to get out. Usually, it will just eat part of the cage, but it can also simply burst through it.
Early on, Lummox gets in trouble, which drives the plot toward a trial in which a group of people want Lummie destroyed. Dangers, they claim. Which is only true if Lummie believes that his Johnny is threatened.
The Department of Spatial Affairs gets involved, along with the local government, and even those two entities don't agree on what needs to be done. At some point, the aliens show up. A race of aliens known as Hroshii show up demanding that their "she child" be returned to them. Of course, the authorities insist that they have no such thing on the planet.
The plot continues to thicken from there. The main characters, Stuart and his pseudo-girlfriend Betty (who fancies herself a lawyer and recently divorced herself from her parents), are lovable and hilarious, and great fun. Lummox is the most delightful science fiction character I have encountered since Willis in Red Planet. Of course, Lummie gets even more interesting when we discover what she is. (I believe I used a masculine pronoun earlier, but that is because, through the first half of the book, we all believe Lummox to be a "he.") And (spoiler alert) we also finally learn that the roles were seemingly reversed, and that John Thomas Stuart XI was actually Lummox's "hobby," as she had been actively raising John Thomas Stuarts for a couple of centuries!
Honestly, this may be my new favorite Robert Heinlein book. I'll have to see how much I still like Stranger when I get around to reading it again.