Starship Troopers

Classic, military, first person sci-fi

There are a lot of nasty and brutal details about military training in a made up future where a man doesn’t have to go to the army, so it must be even worse when a man must do it. But in addition to those we have chapters where the main character wants to leave the army and where he describes too many technical details about his super high-tech infantry suit—both feel too slow and boring. Well I guess a third of the military training part isn't necessary here.

The bugs action starts only at 50% mark and very quickly ends switching to an officer school and after a long time we get a bit more action. But literally 30-40% of the book—probably even more—is military philosophy discussions, talking about duty, describing some regular soldier’s tasks. And all of this is written in a not very interesting way and goes for too long. So mostly it’s a military lecture.

Also there’s almost no description of the enemies, some unusual military slang that can be hard to understand and chapters don’t have any breaks in them while they can last for 30-60 pages.

So the movie is so much better.

When military sci-fi is mentioned, Starship Troopers inevitably comes up as one of the type examples of this genre. Robert Heinlein's classic of the genre has been debated many times - does it glorify the military too much? I think that debate has been had enough and I am not really the best person to ask around it. More to the point for me is - is this a good book?

The novel follows the story of a member of the Mobile Infantry - the Starship Trooper of the title. It follows his career across the training and various engagements that lead to a climactic battle against the ‘bugs'. In many ways this is a standard war novel - you can see similar stories of training and combat in real world scenarios. The Sci-Fi aspects in some ways are fairly incidental.

Of the Heinlein's I have read, this one had the style that has aged the most gracefully. Whilst some of the themes in say Stranger in a Strange Land have not aged well, the power of the military-industrial complex is still as relevant today as it was back in the 1950s. I quite enjoyed this and as a dive into more classic SciFi this was a pleasant trip

I started off liking this book well enough, the military training section held my attention and seemed to have an interesting take on the price and hardship of military service, plus with the unique wrinkle of this world only allowing the right to vote for those who have served a term of that service.

But then it took a nosedive for me. Sometimes it can be hard to distinguish between the voice of a character and the voice of the author, but any scene where a professor or authority figure was monologuing to the main character in a class or where ever and convincing him of some shitty opinion on things like corporal punishment or inalienable rights it was just extremely preachy and pretty disgusting.

Aside from morally questionable content, I just got bored about halfway through as well. There are long drawn out sections where the chain of command and the general makeup of a platoon is discussed. I ended up skimming through a lot of the later parts of the book as I considered dropping it and I just couldn't be bothered to read through it closely.

Here's hoping I enjoy the movie more!

There is little plot but there is character development in the form of Johnnie Rico going from impulsive deciding to join the military, to choosing it as a life career to leading a platoon in a battle.

It is not my thing, as I find the endless military procedure, details, structure, etc. very boring. Yes, there's aliens, spaceships, and fantastic technology, but the science fiction seems almost superfluous here.

Heinlein had a fun, easygoing writing style so it's not as dry of a read as making it out to be.

Superficially it appears to be a celebration of military, war, and discipline but there is a more important point that he was getting to, one of responsibility to the group (family, colleagues, fellow citizens of where you live, etc.) as opposed to focusing on yourself as an individual.

“Under our system every voter and officeholder is a man who has demonstrated through voluntary and difficult service that he places the welfare of the group ahead of personal advantage.”

Violence is horrifying and should be a last resort, but I think Heinlein was emphasizing the notion of making sacrifices to a greater good rather than glorifying war.

I first read this book many years ago. After reading John Scalzi's old Man's War series, I thought I would revisit it as Scalzi's books rang some bells with Heinlein's book.

I had forgotten about Heinlein's authoritarian, xenophobic, right wing views. I was probably about 12 when I first read it and quite enjoyed it then. Can't say I did this time.

I knew about this book, hard not to. Never seen the movie before, though, I don't watch many. But I guess, it was time to get on this one.

Johnnie is a normal high school student in the future, where space travel is readily available. Though there is one more thing about said future; only people who have served in their version of (space) army have the right to vote. They are the only full rights citizens.
Now our Johnnie doesn't join because he is just so passionate about the whole thing. He does because a friend also does, just like a cute girl from his class.
Then, while he is training... a war with space bugs starts.

When we read books about the future or a utopia/dystopia, the focus is usually someone special. Someone who changes the world, someone who causes big events to happen. A genius, a hero, someone like that. Johnnie is good at what he does, he puts in effort and is a good person, but he is not unique. He is not some magical special person. He is just one who gets caught up in events and does the best he can. It makes the book much more approachable; you can totally understand Johnnie.
It also helps with a lot of the technical details. I'm not someone who is super knowledgeable about science, but hey. The protagonist isn't either. He explains how the in-universe things work in practice, so you understand what's going on, but at the same time, it doesn't go into such details that make it difficult if you are not into science. Which was a great decision; it doesn't date the book too badly.

For a novel that plays out in space, it is not huge when it comes to scale. There are only a few more important characters and they are used sparingly. The story feels much more intimate this way, with interactions only being used without the full relationships between the characters fully portrayed. A lot of it is not even resolved; without spoilers, there are a couple of times when we are told Johnnie wants to/will meet someone again and we never get to see that.
We also often don't see the reactions to deaths, just get told it happened. You could think it makes things less emotional, but overall, this is a book with very little theatrics.

What it has a lot is people thinking about... society, I suppose. How it works, how we make it work. Those parts can be a bit dense, but they are never drawn out and I don't felt preached at. Possibly because as those things were mentioned, Johnnie was also learning and trying to understand them. I'm not even attempting to explain said things in detail, though, just read it. Mr. Heinlein did a better job than I would.

I think this is a good choice for even people who are not that deep in sci-fi and I understand why it's condsidered a classic.

There are a few things you can always count on in a Heinlein book. Women have equal if not more strengths as men. A lot of free thinking about sex and politics. This book does not disappoint there. Johnny Rico joins the military with his friend and because of a girl. He moves up the ranks quickly. Then a war breaks out and he has to really grow up. I kept getting the story confused with [b:Old Man's War 51964 Old Man's War (Old Man's War, #1) John Scalzi https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1487044882s/51964.jpg 50700]. It's obvious there that Scalzi read this book and used the aliens as type. Bug-type that is. LOL. I like some of Heinlein's other books better but this was enjoyable.

I first read this while traveling in the summer of 2014. I'd seen the movie, so I thought I knew what I was getting into, but this book blew my socks off. Not only that, but I couldn't believe how different the book was, where was Denise Richards? The troopers wear mobile suits? Neodogs? Why did the military government have such an American ring to it? I wish I had sat down and took some notes from that first read, but I didn't. It feels weird to review on a re-read and this book already has like a million reviews anyway, so I guess this will be more like a blog entry than an actual review. If you haven't read this book, but you like SF then do yourself a favor and read it, the same goes for fans of the movie and more generally for people with pulses who like good books.

I recently read Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis, it's a completely opposite end of the spectrum type of book compared to Starship Troopers. But I want to note that Troopers came out just 5 years after Lucky Jim. They couldn't be more different books, but they're both classics as far as I am concerned. Somewhere in the time between them, one era ended and another began. I see the impact of the times in both of these books: In Jim we see the angst of the post-war educated and a rejection of the old ordering of society. Troopers takes that post-war influence and extrapolates it onto a galaxy-spanning human empire, the concept of a technocratic authoritarian future looming large in the aftermath of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

I would call this one of the modern classics.

Modern? This book is 60 years old! You say.

This book is old. You'd be forgiven for seeing the publishing date and thinking that fact would reflect in the writing. Let's get one thing straight, minus the Neodogs and small traces of the Leave it to Beaver Era vocab, I thought this could have been published last week. The secret sauce here is that unlike something relatively contemporary to Troopers, something like Lucky Jim, this is genre writing. At this point in time, I get the sense that the modern tropes for the SF genre were being unveiled. The SF stories of the Golden Age started taking on a more realistic tone. The concept of a technologically advanced future was legitimized as we gained the ability to vaporize whole cities. The period in which this was published is the transition between the Golden Age and the New Wave of SF. We're talking Bradbury to Dick, books like 1984 and I, Robot, ad infinitum; these classics went on to define the genre's unique embrace of hard edged science and political philosophy.

That's the best thing about Troopers (and SF larger still), even if you find the philosophy contained therein to be a little dusty or unsound, there is a philosophy to engage with, and it's a philosophy that modern readers are more than capable of engaging with. A lot of early SF that made a mark were books that delivered this engaging blend of interstellar scenario and secret philosophy essay. But those titles which predate this period never really got the story mechanics as polished as they were by this point, compare Huxley and Burroughs to Bradbury or Asimov. To me, Troopers embodies this personal definition of modern SF, it's a philosophy dissertation masquerading (quite well) as a pulpy SF Man vs Alien story.

The philosophy is a double-edged sword here. I think the main thing that holds Troopers back for a lot of people is that the philosophy of the book is absolute blue bleeding conservative fascism. I think that it is perfectly acceptable to read this book and think that it's disgusting and perverse; this window into the possible future is heartbreaking and pessimistic. Furthermore, I think the modern worldview is in part defined by the active prevention of a Kipling tinted future. To learn the right lesson from the tragedies of both World Wars is to stand in opposition to endless war and military rule. In blowing the whistle and calling Nazi, you would in-fact be echoing the critical reception this book received from its contemporaries and from scholars in the following decades.

I say all that, so I don't sound an apologist for this next part. This book is a product of its time to its core. This is the postwar era, the president has been General Ike for the last two terms, and here comes another veteran in JFK. The America of this time is the post Korea-post McCarthy-baby boom-domino theory American Empire we're talking about. To read Starship Troopers and not see it belie the course of American politics in the 1950s is to put one's own head in the sand. Consider that Heinlein is painting with the colors of the time, and you will see that this work is not entirely self-consistent. Given a purity test, there are some elements that read as liberal, elitist, or even libertarian alongside the more apparent Fascist overtones; there's a dual-handedness to a lot of the ideas as they are presented. Women in this book are a perfect example of what I'm talking about: on one hand it's a progressive concept to have women serve alongside men, on the other hand how much of this book is antiquated machismo and paternalism directed in the female direction (a lot). There is some nuance here is my point, and I choose to take it as Heinlein inviting the reader to grapple with the philosophy rather than espousing those beliefs as right and true.

I think that invitation to grapple is the ethos that inspired the satirical nature of the movie (Of course, I have to mention the movie, name a more iconic pairing). I think that in nerddom it's rare to see a movie that strays so far from the source material wind up being the most appropriate adaptation. I don't think I would be such a fan of the movie if I wasn't also a fan of the book. Even without reading Troopers, you can see the satire in the film-it's dripping off of the poster. Once I gave this book a read I found myself appreciating the movie differently, a straight adaptation may as well just be an extended recruitment advertisement and even that remark makes its way into the film. As a satire the film manages to highlight the aspect of Troopers that dares you to disagree, it has its own magic and message and without that aspect to it, I doubt Troopers would be a definitive cult classic in either medium.

TL;DR: It's classic for a reason, and it isn't a tough or boring read either.

Meh.

This is one of the few books where as it turns out, the movie was better. There's some action, and you get a bit of hearing about the neat equipment that gets to be used, but that's really it. The rest of the book is more the internal journey of someone who joined the military because his buddy and the hot girl from his school were joining, to getting through basic, and then deciding to make a career of it during the bug war.

One thing I did notice was as soon as Rico got over his hump, from then on out the government and military could do no wrong. In fact, that's what it seemed the system was set up to be, that if you wanted a right such as voting, you would need to buy into complete and utter loyalty to the government no matter what. The attitudes from the higher-ups to both soldiers and even to civilians seems to be “You're too stupid to understand this so just let us handle all the big thinking for you, okay?” That's where the book loses me, making the assumption that anyone not at a certain level in the system is just stupid.

I don't think I'll be reading this one again anytime soon.

This book was a completely different experience than what I imagined at the beginning of the book.
The movie is only loosely based on this book and doesn't approach the messages and opinions of Rober A. Heinlein.
Being the second book I read from Mr. Heinlein I can say he was a very opinionated person, nothing compared with Orson Scott Card and some ideas might prove to be effective if given the chance.
Loved the duality between authority and responsibility to the point when clearely explained why a functional milistaristic and meritocratic regime could work at least in fiction.
A recommended reading for anyone who has finished with Asimov and/or want some perspective on military training fiction.

Normally I give books I dislike the benefit of the doubt when they have such a high rating; maybe I'm not astute enough in the literary sense or maybe I just have not reached the age yet when I can assess something critically when I don't like it. I am human. I am prone to error. My opinions may not have enough nuance, especially when they disagree with the general consensus that Starship Troopers is actually a good book. A great one. A literary classic even.

But believe me when I say it: this is THE worst book I have ever read. Period.

And unless I deliberately go out of my way to find a book that is worse than this, this book will remain to be one of the most unpleasant, condescending, and agonizing experiences I have ever had with a book. This book is pure militaristic propaganda and going in with knowledge around the debate of whether this was actually a satire or not should have been more than enough to signal me to avoid this book.

I usually never finish books I don't like. Life is too short for that but I decided to stick with it to really justify my opinion. My attention waned and I don't feel like I got all the nuance due to my mind glazing over words, sentences, and sometimes paragraphs - but this time around I was a masochist.

To avoid the book's politics is to avoid this book entirely. This book was written in response to Heinlein objecting against Eisenhower's decision to cease testing on nuclear weapons in 1959 and coinciding with Heinlein's health related discharge from the military, not allowing him to see combat he decided to make sure he got a taste of it by writing about it, making sure to infuse his politics within it and make this pro-recruitment propaganda that the US Army came around to recommend years later.

This book follows the story of a young soldier in the future (“Johnnie”) as he goes from a reluctant man who yearns to join the military despite facing disapproval at home to a super competent military officer in the face of an endless war against evil bugs invading their planet.

But really, the premise for this book may as well be cited for false advertising. This book never needed to be science fiction in fact. Aside from fighting a future war with powered armor, this book barely has anything to do with high tech. You would expect some grand epic space battle - but getting to that point is an excuse to spend over 70-80 pages (or basically half) dedicated to boot camp and how it operates.

Not necessarily a bad thing, boot camp is the best part of the movie Full Metal Jacket. So you would assume that this would build character and give depth to worldbuilding, my criticisms of this be damned. But that's the thing: it doesn't. So much of the book is dedicated to the day to day routine of boot camp; the importance of the food and being able to sleep in any condition. Or marching. Or hearing about how officers try to justify their cruel punishment is not a violation of the 8th Amendment and how they are forced to whip their men when they don't want to.

Much of this is just an excuse for the author to go on tirades as to how veterans should be the only people eligible to vote and participate in democracy and hold a job. Much of this is an excuse for the author to explore false conflict as Johnnie struggles to continue and dedicates an entire chapter (!) to thinking about the pros and cons of being a soldier. Society collapsed because parents didn't punish their children enough, not because of a massive energy crisis, political corruption, or an economic recession. No, because this generation is bad unlike the previous generation which had no problems whatsoever.

There are no characters in this book, there are simply mouthpieces to espouse propaganda. They go on speeches, monologues, and soliloquies about how great it is to be in the military and why we should cower and quake before soldiers and let them run the government. We can't forget about how a lot of it is just talking about how the military is organized into platoons and squads, just a whole lot of exposition and false conflict that leads to more exposition.

The protagonist isn't this cool everyman we relate to and see him become strong, we see him instead do guard duty and eat dinner. We hear about the cool stuff rather than see it. His character arc into macho man isn't given the depth it needed because surprise! - it's not given enough time.

If there is some merit to it being science fiction, it's that the enemy is a bunch of faceless bugs without a motive. Sounds like Heinlein's trying to purposely dehumanize the enemy and make them out to be monsters. Because war is always justified when you cannot reason with the enemy!

This is a book in the way that you could put two pieces of bread together and call it a sandwich. This is just a collection of words together that was vetted by the US Military to enlist with the occasional reference to space thrown in so you don't realize you're reading a 250 page pamphlet.

Big fan of the movie but never read the book, until now. Some give it negative reviews due to the vast differences between the two, the fact that the book concentrates mainly on the troops training and character development, whereas the movie more on the fighting. I liked those differences. In this way, the two complement each other and you can go from one to the other and see a journey.
Others say it is not really science fiction but of course it is, with its battle suits and arachnid beings, just subtly done.
As for Heinlein displaying too much of his political views? Don't a lot of writers? Aren't a writers opinions the basis of many books?

Executive Summary: One of those rare cases where I liked the movie better than the book.

Audio book: This was my first book narrated by Lloyd James. If I can help it, it will be my last. He's far from the worst narrator I've had, but after coming off a Micheal Kramer reading in my last book, he seemed extra bad.

He's reading felt wooden. No real emotion or inflection at all. It did seem to get a bit better as it went on, but never into good territory.

Full Review
This one has been on my list for awhile. I saw the movie back in high school and really enjoyed it. I've heard complaints from fans of the book that it's not a very good adaptation. In my opinion that's for the best.

It's probably a matter of expectations though. I was hoping for a fun fast paced military sci-fi story. But there is very little action in this book. Much of it is spent in training. And I didn't find that all too exciting much of the time.

I know this book is old, and Heinlein couldn't/wouldn't swear but the language really got me. They didn't feel like soldiers to me with how they talked. This probably wasn't helped at all by the wooden narrator. After something like Full Metal Jacket or my vague memories of the movie, the book camp part was a pretty big disappointment.

I think a lot of people focus on the politics of this book and it's pro-war/ultra patriotism. I can understand why. It makes up most of the story. Personally I was mostly just bored by it.

The overall story was pretty good though. Maybe that's why I liked the movie. I guess the book just wasn't quite for me. It's good, but not great. I'm still glad I finally read it though.

It was rather short, I am kinda used to living in a SciFi universe, Asimov's Foundations, Clarks' Ramas and Heinlein's Moon colony in Moon is a harsh mistress was portrayed in much more detail.
But nevertheless, it was a good read, had some strange but well tought ideas about society governance and it had the Heilineian touch to it.

2022 read:

Re-read an English copy this time and still as good as I remember.

2016 read:

Esta es la novela que catapultó mi amor por la ciencia ficción militar. En ella Heinlein explora, a través de los ojos de Johnnie Rico y la Infantería Móvil, el honor, la madurez y la supervivencia. No hay que estar de acuerdo con sus ideologías políticas y militares para disfrutar del libro; yo prefiero ser pragmático y abrocharme el cinturón. Más allá del criticismo es válido evaluar si es inevitable el conflicto y la violencia en todas las situaciones. ¿De qué otra forma podemos obrar cuando una raza alienígena de insectos destruye nuestras ciudades y amenaza nuestra especie? ⠀
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Es un libro que ha trascendido e inspirado a toda una legión de escritores como Haldeman, Steakley, Card o Scalzi; algunos juegos como StarCraft; y una película en 1997. Juzguen si estas páginas son dignas de su tiempo.

It won the Hugo. It is a classic. I had expectations. I enjoyed Stranger in a Strange Land. I had seen the movie.

I was underwhelmed. I knew it was different than the movie, but I think what happened was that in transforming it from a YA novel to an adult novel, it kind of landed in a limbo that was less than the sum of its parts.

There was a lot of philosophizing. It is known for that. I didn't take it as preachy, or necessarily as a manifesto of Heinlein's personal beliefs. He explored issues, and that doesn't mean he espouses them.

I was in the Navy for ten years. I felt there was a lot of wink-wink, nod-nod such that when he was overblowing the rah-rah spirit of military he was doing it tongue-in-cheek. There is a kind of eye towards the military that someone who had been in the military, like him, would resonate with.

One of the chapters that resonated the most with me was the one where he was describing being assigned to a Navy ship that had women on it. It is absolutely true the rivalry between branches of the armed services, particularly between Navy and Marines. And there is nobody more rah-rah than Marines, in my experience. So the rivalry felt true. The opinion of the Navy that all other branches are unnecessary because the Navy could take care of it all is shared by many. In real life we always heard a saying that “the Army has more boats than the Navy and the Navy has more planes than the Air Force.”

The other part of that chapter, about the sequestering of the women except for officers, and standing guard to make sure people didn't go forward of the restricted area rang true, also. I've seen many times where military men would code-switch in the presence of women, even though some military women were rougher and cruder than some of the men. There would be less swearing, more deference, and constant guard against fraternization. It is a potent dynamic. I was on submarines, and there were no women. Now they do allow women on submarines and I'd love to talk to someone who has experienced that, especially a woman to get her point of view.

Back to the story, the first half of it was okay because I kind of knew where it was going but not quite. The second part was less enjoyable because I always gloss over when they start using lots of ranks of services I'm not familiar with, and describing platoons and squads and other groupings of personnel that I don't know the difference between.

The mission for “Operation Royalty” was interesting and enjoyable, and the end of the novel was satisfyingly open-ended for there to be a sequel. Perhaps on further reflection or reading, now that I know what to expect, it will increase in my estimation. It did inspire me to pick up Heinlein's Expanded Universe book to read more about the backstory of this story, and I look forward to exploring more of his works.

For the most part, I enjoyed the book. I appreciated the philosophy on duty and maybe the more mundane parts of being a solider, something I'll never be. However, there were parts I flat out disagreed with, namely the rant that corporal punishment is good and social workers and child psychologists were wrong. He points toward hitting dogs and rubbing their noses in their accidents as proof that he's right.

There's so much wrong in one small paragraph. Hitting teaches that hitting solves problems, it usually doesn't. Positive reinforcement is generally the best way to train a dog and crazy enough it works great for kids too (maybe not all, but it's worked great for my kid who was deemed spirited by quite a few people). Additionally, social workers and child psychologists can do remarkable things for us as a society and the idea that if we just hit people more is so reductive that I'm kinda flummoxed by it.

All of that said, there were parts of the book I really enjoyed, I'm just not sure I'd go around recommending it to everyone. I think it hits hard with it's idea and philosophy and duty and I can't think of another book that does it nearly as well, but there's a lot of baggage that goes with it.