Book #106 of 2018:The Door into Summer by Robert A. HeinleinThis 1957 sci-fi romp is fun, but it bea
Book #106 of 2018:The Door into Summer by Robert A. HeinleinThis 1957 sci-fi romp is fun, but it bears many problematic hallmarks of the genre fiction written by white men in that era. Minor setbacks are blithely compared to slavery and rape, female characters are treated patronizingly, and the 30-year-old protagonist kind of falls in love with a preteen girl. (She asks him to marry her before he enters cryogenic sleep. He says that if she still feels that way when she turns 21, she can go into suspended animation herself at that point, and they can get married when they wake up in the future together. It’s a pretty small part of the overall plot, and you can argue that the character ultimately has adult agency, but their romance verges on predator grooming in a way that personally makes me uncomfortable.)If you can get past all of that, this novel really is a neat little adventure story from the golden age of science-fiction, with clever time loop shenanigans and some imaginatively goofy visions of the then-future. It especially sparkles anytime the hero shows his utter devotion to his pet cat, as when he insists that it get cryo-frozen along with him. But the book is very much a product of its time, and some modern readers may wish to give it a miss.★★★☆☆ -- source link
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