The Beamers, having a fondness for classic science fiction, are not always as familiar with the Big Three (Asimov, Clarke, Heinlein) as we might wish to be. So, to rectify another missing piece of our reading history, we went after a late novel in the career of the “Dean” of science fiction, Robert Heinlein, looking into his multiversal work, The Cat Who Walks Through Walls, a novel that combines murder mystery, spy hijinks ala Bond, and some looped (and loopy) time traveling. Would the snappy banter of the married protagonists bring out our love of “screwball” comedy, or would the snapping of the suspenders of disbelief leave us with our trousers down around our ankles?
From Dean to Big Screen
Robert Heinlein was a founding member of sf’s “Golden Age” (1938-1946), published originally with John W. Campbell in the pages of Astounding (later, Analog) magazine. His popularity was great enough to earn him space in the “slick” magazines of the time, like The Saturday Evening Post, as well as getting Hollywood to come calling for screenplays to film (Destination Moon, 1950). He is best known for his “juveniles” (YA novels, in today’s terms) and for his much more “adult” works of the early 1960s (Starship Troopers, Stranger in a Strange Land, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress), along with his strong adherence to libertarianism, often reflected in his use of the acronym TANSTAAFL (“There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch”). Late in his career, he introduced the concept of the World as Myth, where the basis of reality is placed on the belief given to a universe, making the land of Oz as “real” as Australia and equally available for visit (after suitably arduous journeying, in either case).
The Cat Who Walks Through Walls is the next-to-last novel Heinlein wrote. In it, Richard Ames (aka Col. Colin Campbell) becomes a target of a murder plot, entangled with the politics of space habitats and Moon pressure domes, and enlisted into the Time Corps, all with the objective of restoring a lost artificial intelligence (Mike HOLMES IV, the sentient computer that organized the Lunar revolt of The Moon is a Harsh Mistress). Why Richard? Why not?, especially if the history books already say that he did it. Along the way, the reader is treated to a succession of Heinlein characters being re-introduced (Lazarus Long and his fellow red-headed immortals, Jubal Harshaw, Hildy Corners), with even Richard’s new bride, Gwen, revealed to be Hazel Stone. The murder plot, it turns out, was a staged affair meant to get Richard off the trail of Mike, and the Time Corps is anxious to recruit him for the same reason. Not that the plethora of perils into which Richard and Gwen/Hazel plunge is always clearly connected. Not until the final page does the book come clean and offer its rationale, one that Richard himself was questioning up to that last paragraph.
Juggling is easy, if you do not worry about all the balls …
It all might have worked if Heinlein had kept control of his material. The opening chapters offer a fast-paced action sequence of a couple in the midst of a murder that is orchestrated by the Powers That Be, putting them in plenty of trouble and leaving only their quick wits and witty quips to help save their necks. I could see this part of the book being a fine beginning for a classic Hitchcock film (“Strangers on a Space Station”?), and the dialogue could be taken from (or snuck into) the Nick & Nora Charles (“Thin Man”) films of the 1930s. Chris found a number of “laugh out loud” passages in the writing. But, Richard and Gwen/Hazel are not quite as sophisticated as the Charles couple, and several Beamers found that the dialogue was more cute-sy than cute, and way too verbose for the amount of plot being unloaded. Both Alan and Kathy were dissatisfied with how the book so rapidly devolves from plot to ineffectual blather. And while 1930s movies have their charm, it is harder to see it in a 1980s novel, given the relative roles of women and men having equalized a lot in the intervening 50 years (never mind as a representation of 2088).
And the plot not only unloads, but it also unravels. Beamer Nick felt that he was reading 2 different books, one a murder mystery/Bond spy mystery, the other a confusing time-travel paradox peopled by a lot of confusingly related cloned red-heads (the Howard families!). That division of the book was a major obstacle for all of us. For Heinlein fans, the second half of the book is a massive piece of fan service, like that reveal of Gwen as Hazel Stone, mother in The Rolling Stones, young rebel in Moon is a Harsh Mistress. But even those of us familiar with Heinlein’s “future history” could wonder if having so many old characters recycled in a new book would help or hurt the reading experience. For Heinlein, introducing his “World as Myth” concept, it strengthens the reality of all his fiction to have it coalesce into a single future (cf. Asimov stitching up his robot books with his Foundation works in the last few novels of his career). For the fan, though, it feels like Heinlein is stretching his own works too thinly. Alan, a fan of Philip Jose Farmer, reflected on how PJF created a single background (the “Wold Newton family”) to tie together the (in)famous Victorian pulp heroes and villains, allowing him to write crossovers with Tarzan meeting Sherlock Holmes. Heinlein’s similar attempt here falls short. Worse, I thought that fans might be less pleased since the promise of seeing Mike revived is left unfulfilled by the end of the book. In the Hitchcock sense, Mike is truly the Macguffin of this film.
Demoted from Dean to Adjunct?
Plus, much of the later work falls short of Heinlein’s standards. John found the use of stereotyped characters to detract from the reality of the book. Alan was not sure if orbital mechanics are the stuff of pulse-pounding conspiracy thrillers. We never unraveled the temporal paradox rules, as at least 3 time-lines were in play (distinguished by who first walked on the Moon: Armstrong/Aldrin or one of Heinlein’s early characters), but history could not be revised without unforeseen consequences unless Mike were re-activated. An African-American character named Samuel Beaux is regrettably tagged as “Sambo”, but that is OK since (big reveal!) Richard is also African-American. Really? And we shall speak not of various bits of banter involving the carnal spanking of underaged females.
Overall, then, we could not muster up much affection for this late work of the late Dean of SF. A couple of generous 6s were granted, but 3s and 4s were the norm. As mentioned in the Beamer notes on The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, a good way to start a loud discussion at a sf convention is to ask, “What is the last ‘good’ Heinlein?” We are pretty sure that it will not turn out to be one where the cats walk through walls (or go ‘Blert!’, no less).
