When I was a boy scout I was told that I should read Farmer in the Sky by Robert Heinlein. I was told that it was published, in an abridged format, in the Boys Life magazine. The inside cover conveys this as well, mentioning that it was titled, "The Satellite Scout." As the more hard core sci-fi was not my usual cup of cocoa, all I knew about the book was that the main character was an Eagle Scout. As I was borrowing books from Dad and exploring more sci-fi, I figured that it was time to finally sit down and read Farmer in the Sky. While it takes me a while, I try to read the books my parents recommend. As per the usual, I was not disappointed. Heinlein is one of the grandfathers of sci-fi, and as I recently pre-ordered a sci-fi book,Her Brother's Keeper by Mike Kupari, I figured that I ought to establish some roots. Especially since Kupari pointed out that the space ships in his book, "land on their tails as Heinlein intended." Farmer in the Sky was published sixty-five years ago and while dated (no references to calculators but several to slide rules) I would say it still holds up.
Plot: Bill and George are headed to Ganymede, emigrants headed for the small colony on Jupiter's largest moon. The trip will take two months and they're not sure exactly what will happen when they get there, but they know that they are going. This means some big changes for the father and son team. Bill suddenly finds out that he's getting a step-mother and step-sister. He won't be going to school in the near future. And he will be leaving his scout troop. But the changes continue when they reach the Jovian moon and find out that the planners back on Earth hadn't listened to the colony's demands for less people and more equipment. Now Bill has to decide how he, George, and their new family are going to survive in this outer world wilderness.
Plot: Bill and George are headed to Ganymede, emigrants headed for the small colony on Jupiter's largest moon. The trip will take two months and they're not sure exactly what will happen when they get there, but they know that they are going. This means some big changes for the father and son team. Bill suddenly finds out that he's getting a step-mother and step-sister. He won't be going to school in the near future. And he will be leaving his scout troop. But the changes continue when they reach the Jovian moon and find out that the planners back on Earth hadn't listened to the colony's demands for less people and more equipment. Now Bill has to decide how he, George, and their new family are going to survive in this outer world wilderness.
My favorite parts: The narrative was great. Bill was a solid narrator that felt natural and had his imperfections. I liked the characters and even though I didn't feel myself getting sucked into the book, I realized halfway through that Heinlein had enticed me deep enough that I really cared for the characters, and was invested in the story. The book did a great job of balancing sci-fi's traditional tech heavy dialog with good story telling. You learn how they are able to do everything but I didn't get bogged down in the descriptions.
Considerations: There's a reason this book was released in a middle grade level publications. There wasn't anything that was questionable and it would read well for many ages. It's clear to me why my parents recommended it to me as a young boy scout (age 11-12).
If I were to introduce my children to sci-fi, I would probably start with this book. It's clean, it's a traditional sci-fi story format, and it's not too long. I'm sure that's what my parents were trying to do. The total length was 224 pages.
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