Skippable early Heinlein (1940's). Three weak novellas and a decent short story. Two of the novellas have bad pacing problems, both starting off with vigorous story then stalling out with interminable exposition. "Lost Legacy" is the better of the two. The multiple worlds novella just never got any traction with me, I couldn't care about any of the characters. The short story "Jerry Was A Man" is the only reason to pick this up, and raised my review a whole star. ( )

Rereading this book, it's better than I remembered—but there were more places that haven't aged well than I thought I would find. Heinlein's world of the future is still (mostly) very white and male. The few exceptions were probably groundbreaking at the time.

I came across a reference to "Gulf" (the first of four stories in this book) having connections to Heinlein's novel Friday, prompting this re-read. I'm glad I did. These stories all share the themes of what it means to be human, and most of them deal with transcending humanity.

Heinlein's ability to keep a story moving is unparalleled, and this book is no exception. I think there are more Heinlein re-reads in my future. ( )

This is an early Heinlein that should appeal to lovers of the genre, or lovers of Heinlein. I really liked the first story which turned out to be a forerunner to one of my favorite Heinlein books, Friday, but the rest in the collection were just okay. ( )

Arguably some of Heinlein's best short fiction, Assignment in Eternity offers four fantastic tales including:

"Gulf" - A secret agent named Gilead is rescued from captivity by a clandestine organization of highly trained supermen and women. Although they seem nefarious at first, Gilead soon realizes that they are, in fact, noble and agrees to join them. After being trained in their ways, he undertakes a mission to stop a weapon of mass destruction.

"Elsewhen" - A university professor engages five students in an experiment to travel to across space and time merely by the power of hypnotism, opening portals to strange and distant worlds, one of which is engulfed in war with an alien race while the other is a serene paradise of godlike beings.

"Lost Legacy" - A physician, a psychologist, and a parapsychologist manage to tap into their latent abilities of clairvoyance, telepathy, levitation, and telekinesis. Soon after, they find themselves drawn to Mount Shasta in Northern California where they encounter a group of mystics who have long ago mastered such abilities and are waiting for the right opportunity to reveal themselves to the world in the hopes of setting humanity on a path to enlightenment. First, they must overcome evil forces as ancient and powerful as they, forces who wish to keep humanity ignorant and servile.

"Jerry was a Man" - A wealthy couple visits a genetic engineering firm where animals of almost any configuration can be manufactured. During a tour, the wife encounters a polite, elderly ape named Jerry who can speak, but is on death row as he has outlived his usefulness. She is appalled and demands to adopt Jerry, against the company's policy. The situation escalates to a court hearing for the purpose of determining whether Jerry is entitled to the same rights as humans. ( )

This is a collection of 4 novellas/short stories written by Robert A. Heinlein that are loosely related in that examines what makes one a human. The first one is Gulf (1949). It is starts out like a spy novel and is about a group of superior beings, supermen, as a new step in humanoid evolution. The second book is Lost Legacy (1939), which is the book that is the foundation for the author's Stranger in a Strange Land. Everybody has paranormal abilities that can be found through training. The third book is Elsewhen (1939) which is a book about the human mind not being bound in the here and now. This one addresses time travel, or parallel universe. The last book is Jerry was a Man (1947) which looks at genetically engineered intelligent creatures.

Heinlein annoyed me in Stranger in a Strange Land and in these books because he seems to only see women as partial equals to men with a roll of marriage and childbearing, but if you look at the dates of these works, you realize that he was ahead of his time. In these books women have equal abilities and opportunities but of course the women still want marriage and children. The story about Jerry has overtones of civil rights and the way whites treated blacks. It also is ahead in looking at Biotech. ( )