I quite enjoyed this one, but I can certainly understand how a teenage reader today could find it difficult to relate. It's not just the science and technology that we have already commented upon, but the values and attitudes are also from the 50s. Even when Heinlein introduces differences (see for example the casual relationship Bill has with his father) those differences are defined against 50s' customs (as is to be expected, of course), and in more than 60 years we have changed a lot.

This is a book about terraforming and about pioneers founding a colony on one of Jupiter's moons. Their plight and the hard work and harshness they endure reminds us a lot of the pioneers who colonized the west of the US, which obviously is the inspiration here. There are enough differences and science fictional flavor to capture the imagination of the target audience. There is also a lot of emphasis placed on scouting, which is part of the wholesome message of this old-fashioned YA story, but perhaps that is still relevant to at least some teens today, since the scouting movement is still going strong.

Anyway, once more the outlook is hopeful: with hard work and effort you can achieve your dreams and improve your lot, but here there is more harshness and tragedy than in any of the previous books. Perhaps it caught me in the right mood, but I particularly enjoyed the last part of the book and I have to admit I even shed a couple of tears.

I also appreciated how the personality of the main character was drawn. He is a nice kid and has a lot of good qualities, but he is far from perfect. He sometimes acts like an ass... I mean, like a teenager, he sometimes has a big mouth and thinks he knows much more than he really does.

There are some long expository talks about how ecology works, and about other scientific matters, but I missed an explanation of how exactly the "heat trap" that allowed people to live on Ganymede worked. I found it curious how Heinlein seemed to regard food shortages as an important future problem as the population grows, while he doesn't seem to be worried about energy shortages. Clearly he expected that we would find out how to use nuclear fusion, while he did not expect the improvements in crop productivity. (We still have food problems, though, and they can get bad if we don't keep improving productivity). There was a awkward conversation which showed clearly that Heinlein did not understand relativity at all when he wrote this. You could be charitable and say that it was the teacher character the one who didn't understand it, but I'm sure it was Heinlein.

And what the hell was that about the alien artifacts? It seemed to come out of nowhere.

All in all, a satisfying if old-fashioned SF story. ( )

Um livro ágil e equilibrado sobre imigrantes que vão a colonizar Ganímedes, em Júpiter, abordando sua viagem, seus problemas, e a difícil missão de prosperar como fazendeiros. Não deixa de ser curioso o quanto esses humanos do futuro são tipicamente estado unidenses da década de 50, com todo o lado macho garoto escoteiro, patriarca engenheiro, dona de casa atrapalhada e vizinhos guerreiros, "sobreviventes". Mas creio que a escrita cativante e os episódios mundanos, mas futuristas, e as considerações sobre agricultura superam esse lado retrô, em um bom livro, com essa ressalva.

Vencedor do prêmio Hugo 1951 (retro-Hugo 2001). ( )

More representative of RAH in his Boy's Life phase, a city boy and his father join the fledgling colony on Ganymede and find it's even harsher than they expected. The hours and days in the promised land are not just filled backbreaking work but also with politics, arguments over land and gumption, and fields of rock. Very strong characters and story. ( )

Interesting story of a teen going to one of Jupiter's moons in order to homestead. There's enough science to make the narrative believable, but not so much as to bore the reader. I liked it quite a bit, and am keeping my copy for a future reread. ( )

This is a 1950s era youth oriented science fiction novel by the grand master of the early years of the genre. It tells the story of a teenage boy and his family as they leave a critically overcrowded Earth and immigrate to the frontier colony on Ganymede, the terraformed moon of Jupiter.

The plot movement is slow as Heinlein explains in detail how everything works. The effort to provide a plausible description of yet to be invented or understood developments is a distinctive feature of early SF. It is analogous to the convention in literary fiction which emphasizes word choice and an obsessive focus on character development at the expense of plot movement.

I suspect most readers today will find this novel lacking in appeal but the story in its essence is the stock tale that underlies “coming of age” teen literature. ( )