Maxim reviewed Double Star by Robert A. Heinlein
Mediocre
3 stars
Expected more from a Hugo award.
Audio cassette
English language
Published April 7, 2000 by Blackstone Audiobooks.
Double Star
4 stars
(38 reviews)
One minute, down and out actor Lorenzo Smythe was — as usual — in a bar, drinking away his troubles as he watched his career go down the tubes. Then a space pilot bought him a drink, and the next thing Smythe knew, he was shanghaied to Mars.
Suddenly he found himself agreeing to the most difficult role of his career: impersonating an important politician who had been kidnapped. Peace with the Martians was at stake — failure to pull off the act could result in interplanetary war. And Smythe's own life was on the line — for if he wasn't assassinated, there was always the possibility that he might be trapped in his new role forever!
jdavidhacker1 reviewed Double Star by Robert A. Heinlein
None
4 stars
A brief review for a brief story. Double Star focuses on our main character, Smythe, an actor who is recruited to double for an important politician who has been kidnapped. The plot moves briskly along, and while there's a little of the expected Heinlein action early on, there's less than one might expect. Absent also are some of his usual tropes about sexism and sexuality (though we do have an almost entirely male cast of characters). Strangely, in a book centered around politics, there is also little to none of his usual diatribes against socialism, for capitalism, or for some pseudo-fascist libertarian regime. Instead, we see Smythe grow out of initial close-minded, racist and isolationist beliefs and into someone who embraces collectivism across cultures and species. There's also some interesting ranting about the 'artist' and how/why/when he creates/participates in his art that whole ostensibly speaking about acting, feels like it …
A brief review for a brief story. Double Star focuses on our main character, Smythe, an actor who is recruited to double for an important politician who has been kidnapped. The plot moves briskly along, and while there's a little of the expected Heinlein action early on, there's less than one might expect. Absent also are some of his usual tropes about sexism and sexuality (though we do have an almost entirely male cast of characters). Strangely, in a book centered around politics, there is also little to none of his usual diatribes against socialism, for capitalism, or for some pseudo-fascist libertarian regime. Instead, we see Smythe grow out of initial close-minded, racist and isolationist beliefs and into someone who embraces collectivism across cultures and species. There's also some interesting ranting about the 'artist' and how/why/when he creates/participates in his art that whole ostensibly speaking about acting, feels like it must have been to some degree self-referential for Heinlein regarding writing. Overall, great, short read.
Stonebender reviewed Double Star by Robert A. Heinlein
Review of 'Double Star' on 'Goodreads'
4 stars
Fair warning: I'm a huge Heinlein fan, so my reviews of his work aren't exactly impartial. Having said that this is one of my favorite novels of his. It is also one of his more unHeinlein-like stories. His main characters are often rugged individuals with strong dominant personalities but in this story the protagonist needs to subsume himself into another identity in order to succeed. I graduated from UC Berkeley with Dramatic Arts degree. Given the story line is basically about an actor, I found Heinlein's discussions about performance and acting interesting even when I didn't exactly agree with him. This novel was one of his best.
Kevin B. O'Brien reviewed Double Star by Robert A. Heinlein
Review of 'Double Star' on 'Goodreads'
5 stars
This is unusual for Heinlein in that the protagonist is not one his super-competent engineer types, but instead a down-on-his-luck actor. He is shanghaied by a spaceman, and soon find himself on Mars, being asked to impersonate a popular politician. His main qualifications for this is that a) he is an actor, after all; and b) he resembles the politician enough to pull it off. But because "The Great Lorenzo" has no technical skills at all, this book is about human nature and not science and engineering. This is middle period Heinlein, when he had mastered his trade, but before things got out of hand. This is a good read, and was the first of his books to win a Hugo award.
Subjects
- General
- Fiction
- Unabridged Audio - Fiction/Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Audio Adult: Books On Tape
- Science Fiction - General